ANNAN WARRIORS v WEST OF SCOTLAND LADIES.

Last Sunday, the Warriors took on West of Scotland Ladies at Violetbank in their latest National Division 1 match.

The West Ladies beat the Warriors quite convincingly in the away leg earlier on in the season and are still in the promotion hunt.

The Warriors are still dealing with injuries and player unavailability which also added to the task in hand.

A tough match was expected – and so it proved to be with the West Ladies taking the lead in the first few minutes and never looked back.

The main highlight of the first half for the hosts was a try from Jane Stewart, playing for the 58th time for the Warriors, crossed over the whitewash for her 100th try!

The try was well worked and went through a number of phases and most of the forwards and backs before Jane crashed over.

The half time score was 33-5 to the visitors.

The 2nd half was much of the same but the Warriors did score a 2nd try, again through Jane, who outran the flailing West defence to score in the corner.

Final Score: 66-10 to West of Scotland Ladies.

It was a disappointing performance from the Warriors, with too many missed tackles and too many balls lost in the contact areas.

Pick of the Backs though were, unsurprisingly, Jane Stewart and Ciara O’Connell with Back of the Match being Ellie McCormick.

For the Forwards, best on the day were Ruth Peacock, Kim Taylor with Forward of the Match being Rhianna Parker-Clevett

The National 1 Division though is thoroughly split into 2 groups with the top 4 teams having beaten the bottom 4 teams in every match so far this season.

The bottom 4 teams – which includes the Warriors. Ayr, Broughton and Kelso – are for intents and purposes playing a mini league between them to decide who stays up in National 1 next season and who goes down.

The Warriors have only played 1 of the other 3 bottom teams when they beat Broughton Ladies last month at Violetbank so still have 5 matches to play against the bottom teams.

Starting with away to Ayr Ladies on Sunday and then Kelso Ladies at Violetbank the following week.

Big games but if the Warriors can put together the kind of performance they are capable of and showed earlier in the season with the win over Broughton Ladies and the home match against Howe then there is no reason why the Warriors can not get the points they need to stay up. But it’s going to be a tough shift as we head into the 2nd part of the season.

Unfortunately the Warriors squad will be slightly depleted on Sunday with a few more players out through injury and Captain Nicole Barlow unavailable but you know the 15 who take to the pitch on Sunday will give it their all for the black and amber.

The match kicks off at 2pm at the Millbrae.

Warriors Starting 15: E Jardine, S Taylor, J Warrick, R Peacock, M Muir, R Parker-Clevett, K Taylor, K Warrick, N Barlow (c), M McGeoch, J Stewart, C Barnes, C O’Connell, E McCormick, K Barlow

Warriors Subs: I Cook, L Moffat (Both Used)