Edinburgh gain revenge over The Borders

Edinburgh 31 Borders 18

Edinburgh snatched Celtic League derby revenge to book their place in next season’s Heineken Cup – and wreck their rivals’ hopes of playing in the premier European event.

Ironically, the Gunners’ three tries at Murrayfield were shared by former Borders-based stars, David Callam and Fergus Pringle of Hawick.

But the real damage was done by Brendan Laney, who fired over a string of pinpoint kicks as Edinburgh made amends for their New Year defeat at Netherdale.

Borders made a positive start and edged in front after just 60 seconds. The home side wandered offside, leaving Charlie Hore to confidently land the penalty from 25 metres.

Edinburgh seized the initiative in the 12th minute with a try by breakaway forward Callam in the wake of a reversed decision by Welsh referee Neil Ballard.

He initially awarded a pressure-relieving penalty to Borders, then switched the kick to the Gunners for backchat.

They set up a line-out close to the line and Callam was driven over without much resistance.

Edinburgh kept up the momentum and although they struggled to find gaps, they did force Borders to give away a string of penalties which left them a mountain to climb to wrestle their way back into the contest.

Laney was the marksman in form, fresh from revealing he is heading for Japan at the end of the season.

He struck first in the 17th minute from close range when the scrum was deliberately collapsed.

And he followed up with trickier kicks for offside and ball-killing respectively as Borders struggled to cope with the mounting pressure.

But they hit back on the stroke of the interval to gain fresh hope.

It was almost a carbon-copy of Edinburgh’s touchdown as prop Tom McGee was powered over following a penalty line-out, with Hore slotting the conversion.

McGee enjoys facing the capital outfit, having bagged the clinching try in the first meeting of the season between the teams at Netherdale.

The score added a spring to their step and Hore clipped over another penalty to reduce the gap to a single point 14 minutes after the restart.

Laney gave Edinburgh some breathing space when he took his tally to four as the visitors proed too slow to roll clear of the ruck location.

Then came the all-action finale with Pringle and Callam ploughing over in quick succession, Laney’s two conversions taking the Gunners out of reach.

Borders refused to buckle completely and Jonny Weston crossed for a try after a quickly-taken tap-penalty.