THE domestic season has at last ground to a halt, even though most of our pro players will be in action again very soon. Too much rugby? Perhaps. Probably. Yet it is hard to see where a reduction in the number of games played should begin.
Meanwhile, Edinburgh are to be congratulated on finishing second in the Magners League, their best position yet. This was very pleasing, the only reservation being that they got too far behind in the autumn and so were never really challenging for th
e title. Nevertheless, winning their last two matches down in Wales, after giving first the Ospreys and then Cardiff Blues a two-try start was a remarkable achievement, one inconceivable a few years ago when heavy defeats in Wales were common. That they have done so well with an almost entirely home-grown squad speaks well for the future.
The blot on their season was another failure in the Heineken Cup, despite their home and away victories over Castres. The Leinster match at Murrayfield was particularly disappointing, for Edinburgh had the better of the game yet lost because they rather feebly conceded tries. That was a match they should have won, and the sight of Leinster running out to play in the final this afternoon will renew that disappointment sharply.
Still, Edinburgh's squad is a comparatively young one, as indeed is Glasgow's, and both are poised to make further advances next season. One of the more surprising features of the professional game is that, contrary to the expectation that its physicality would shorten careers, successful teams, in the northern hemisphere at least, are getting older. England won the World Cup in 2003 with a team of very experienced players, average age well over 30. Ireland's Grand Slam side this year was much the same, as indeed is Munster. So, barring accidents, we may look to see the Scottish pro teams, and the Scotland side itself, continue to improve over the next two or three years. Experienced sides become harder to beat, more adept at winning close matches.
"Defence wins games," as my old friend Rodney Pow remarks almost every time I meet him on the touchline. That was certainly the case with the Border League final at Langholm last week. The Border League doesn't attract much attention outside the Borders, and fixture congestion makes it hard to organise in a satisfactory format. But it still matters a lot to the clubs, and, though this wasn't a classic game, in some ways not even a particularly good one, both Kelso and Selkirk went at it with remarkable intensity. Kelso will think they should have won, for their pack was dominant, securing not only at least 70 per cent of the ball, but doing so more quickly and cleanly than their opponents. Their backs too showed some nice touches, especially Ross Ford's younger brother, Euan, who made a couple of clever half-breaks in the first 40 minutes. But they were met with an utterly resolute defence, and even when in the last quarter of the game they were camped in the Selkirk 22 and put together at least 30 phases in possession, they were denied time and again.
So defence wins matches, but, except when penalties decide the issue, it does so only if you are capable of breaking out of defence and scoring tries. And Selkirk did this twice, or, rather, their richly talented young left-wing Lee Jones did it, for his two scores were individual efforts which owed nothing directly to his team-mates. The first came when Kevin Utterson sliced an attempted drop-goal, which Jones collected deep in the Selkirk 22, went outside one man, inside another, outside the full-back and was free to score under the posts; the second when he collected a miscued Kelso pass around half-way, beat his man and the cover, to run half the length of the field. Selkirk's most-capped wing, Iwan Tukalo, would have been proud of either try. In both, young Lee showed the pace, balance and good rugby sense of the natural finisher. I have a hunch he may some day move into the centre, for he is developing the physique of an O'Driscoll or a D'Arcy. Whether he does or not, he is a great prospect.
Even so he hasn't been Selkirk's Player of the Year in this remarkable season. That accolade goes to Fraser Harkness, named indeed this week the Premier One Player of the Season. There were some who thought that the bullocking and inventive full-back might struggle to repeat his devastating Second Division form in the top rank, but not a bit of it – he has been every bit as effective, as indeed he was in the club internationals against France and Ireland. No matter the opposition, he contrives to score tries that don't seem on when he gets hold of the ball. A truly remarkable player, and always great fun to watch.
