It was always going to be a big ask for London Scottish to fight a fire on both sides, fielding a side in the famous Melrose Sevens whilst taking care of our Championship commitments on the same day.
After a 22 year absence from the Greenyards, letting our hosts at Melrose down was never an option and so whilst we battled Mosley in the penultimate game of the Championship and after help from a number of different sources, London Scottish took the field to play on behalf of The Bill McLaren Foundation.
Our trademark navy and white kit went out the window and with help from our Melrose sponsors ‘Scotty Brand’ we took the field wearing eye catching pink shirts with navy shorts – later acknowledged as the favourite of the assembled crowd of 10,000.
Captained by Oli Brown and with playing talent drawn from the Scottish 7’s setup, the team put on a sterling performance getting them into the quarter finals of the tournament; although as we reached the business end of the draw it was unsurprising that the lack of match time as a team would begin to play it’s part. A strong Aberdeen FP’s side would eventually knock us out of the tournament before being beaten themselves in the semi finals by eventual winners Saracens.
For London Scottish, our trip north was always going to be about more than just playing in the tournament itself. With the help of ‘Scotty Brand’ the club were able to spend the four days prior to the event touring around all of the Borders main clubs running coaching clinics and spreading the message of healthy eating. It was duly noted by all the organisers that we were the only team to do anything of this nature and should be proud of this fact. During the course of the week, some 300 boys were coached by London Scottish and although we could only progress as far as the quarters the fact that as a club we’ve been able to raise the awareness of our prominent role in Scottish Rugby history to an entirely new and young audience is reward enough.
If you’d like to see our specially designed ‘Scotty Brand’ kit which was created just for Melrose then click here.
We’re first seen at 44mins 17 secs.
