HAWICK 30, MELROSE 22
The largest crowd seen at Mansfield Park for a long time came in anticipation a keenly fought Border Derby between old rivals Hawick and Melrose. Amongst the large crowd were MP Michael Moore and his ex boss Sir Ming Campbell. They were treated to a excellent and bruising clash between the two sides, played in beautiful conditions which must be seen as a good advert for Border rugby.
Melrose's strong pack dominated the opening exchanges and controlled the set pieces initially but Hawick became more and more into the match the longer it went on. Hawick opened the scoring with a Craig Neish penalty but the visitors came back strongly and scored two tries, one converted to take a 12-3 lead. With errors coming into Melrose's play, Hawick started to push forward and were rewarded with a try from new prop Brad Turnbull, converted by Neish. Captain Rory Hutton, who had a great match at stand off, scored near the posts which was again converted by Neish after some sustained pressure from Hawick to give Hawick a 17-12 lead. Both teams shared penalties just before the break with Hawick leading by 20-15.
After the interval, with Melrose down to 14 men following a yellow card just on half time,  Hawick made the extra man tell. Hawick turned the ball over at a scrum close to the Melrose line, the ball was fed out to Rory Scott who scampered over for another converted try. Melrose now upped the pace and had the home side on the back foot which Hawick managed to withstand for only so long. A converted try brought the score back to 27-22. Melrose were now running the ball from their own line but the Hawick defence held firm. The referee blew up after five minutes of injury time but the Hawick celebrations were premature as a penalty had been awarded to Hawick. Craig Neish duly slotted the kick to give Hawick a hard fought win by 30 points to 22 and move up to equal third in the league

Team:- B Sutherland, N Renwick, R Scott, C Neish, ,S Anderson, R Hutton, K Reid, S Fleetwood, M Landels, B Turnbull, M Robertson, G Petrie, N McTaggart, D Landels and A Wilson 

Replacements; G Goodfellow, C Charters, D Lowrie, N Little and G Douglas