HELENSBURGH RFC Eutopia defeated Strathclyde Uni at the weekend in the team’s first competitive fixture.

The Burgh ladies didn’t get the start they were after however and were caught napping within the first two minutes.

Their opponents Strathclyde Uni were quick out of the traps and ran through a sleeping Burgh defence to score between the posts.

A stern talking to by the coach wakened the team up and Burgh Eutopia pressed upfield with controlled pick and drives sucking in the Uni defence to eventually release Canty who ran in comfortably to touchdown between the posts.

Again a lapse in concentration and some extremely poor tackling allowed Strathclyde to cross for their second try.

From kick off Burgh retrieved the ball and set up a number of controlled pods picking and driving to then allow the ball to be spun out to the backs who exploited the gaps in the Uni defence to, yet again level the score through Canty.

Burgh’s tails were now up and the Uni had no real response to the controlled forward play of the home team.

Attacks by the threateningly quick Uni backs were quickly snuffed out by some fearsome Burgh tackling.

This tackling resulted in much loose ball upon which the Burgh backs capitalised with Gammon picking up to sprint through and dot down to give Burgh Eutopia the lead.

A bad injury to Burgh captain Peebles resulted in an early call for half-time when the Burgh coaches were able to highlight areas which could be exploited.

With a pitch change for the second half Burgh flew out the traps and quickly stretched their lead through Canty, the try converted by Rollings.

It was clear that Burgh’s gameplan to tire the Uni players by ensuring that they had to put all their effort into tackling the Burgh Ladies was beginning to pay off and gaps were appearing which the Burgh backs Reid, Campbell and Rolling were starting to exploit.

Burgh had been training hard over the past few weeks and were now using all this in a game situation. The forwards led ably by McKenzie, Chamberlain, Calderwood, Thomson and Lloyd were setting up a platform for the Burgh Eutopia backs to take real advantage of and display the range of handling and speed skills that they had been working on at training.

Wain was controlling the forwards well and releasing the backs when the gaps appeared, she was also tackling like a terrier, epitomised by her hit and drive on a Uni prop which saw the visitor driven back 10m and dumped into touch.

This sparked the forwards into even more effort and yet again they drove into Strathclyde, quickly recycling the ball and releasing the backs to run in tries by Gammon, Canty and Murray.

By now Strathclyde had no response to the Burgh machine and Helensburgh Eutopia Ladies ran out 34-12 in their first serious match.

Team: Gemma McKenzie, Tamara Chamberlain, Shannen Calderwood, Becca Lloyd, Anne Thomson, Sarah Thomson, Amy Peebles (C), Lauren Moy, Hannah Nicholson, Rachael Wain, Emma Rolling, Rachel Nicolson, Zoe Canty, Katy Callan, Ellie Reid, Rebecca Gammon, Georgia Campbell, Hayley Murray.