In a near perfect reflection of the fixture in the West Country between these two sides a year ago. Scottish once again fell short at the final hurdle as Hartpury nicked the win at the death against a spirted Exiles side.

Scottish flew out of the blocks through Alex Wardell to crash over for the opening score after just a handful of minutes. However, an injury to fly half Harry Sheppard forced a reshuffle of the back line to give a Championship debut to young buck Sean Kerr.

Some level of disjointedness ensured and allowed Hartpury to turn the screw. Fighting to wrestle control of the game back, Scottish made errors in an effort to try and turn the tide. Four quick tries, mostly down to the forwards, got Hartpury their bonus point by half time. Only an ingenious quick tap from Will Simons, which put Hayden Hyde away, gave Scottish a sniff going into the break.

Hartpury once again kicked on after the break and extended their lead. However, this is when Scottish managed to flip the script. Ben Waghorn, first busted through from a first phase move to dive for the line in the corner.

Quickly followed up by a lovely break and fend from Will Hobson who dive under the posts to make it a five point ball game. With just five minutes on the clock, young Lucas Friday stepped up with a beautiful snipe around the fringes of a ruck to find the line and Sean Kerr would add the extras to see Scottish take the lead.

However, Hartpury were able to close the game out with some canny game management to work a position before winning a penalty under the posts to seal the game.

A much improved performance from Scottish as they battled back to almost seal a famous win. However, a disappointing first forty will leave Bryan Redpath and Joe Gray wanting more from their squad ahead of next week.