HELENBURGH RFC are revving up for the new league season and welcome old adversaries Forrester FPs to Ardencaple this Saturday for the first of their pre-season warm up matches.

The match kicks-off at 3pm and coach David Calderwood hopes the hard sweat over the last few weeks will turn from perspiration to inspiration against the Edinburgh side.

He said: “Training has been at a good intensity and we’ve worked hard on drills that I hope will pay dividends come match-play. It’s still early in the season, so the lads will have to get used to the knocks and physicality again in order to get up to game-fitness.

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“We know Forrester of old but they will possibly provide a different proposition to the West clubs we’ve been playing in recent seasons, so I think it will be a good test for our lads to gauge where they want to go. Forrester are in the East League division one, so this might be a wee step up for some of us again.”

The two clubs locked horns many times in the 1990s and 2000s, with their last meeting coming a full 10 years ago on league duty.

Indeed, in a most memorable match played at Ardencaple in March 1998, a four-try victory for Helensburgh saw them win National League Division Six, pictured below, under then-skipper Gordon Mackay.

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But that was then, this is now. While pre-season training has been largely productive for Helensburgh, it’s fair to say that numbers are still on the low side for this stage of the season. So the club would continue to appeal to any aspiring, arriving or retiring rugby players in the area to come on down and join the Green Machine.

Helensburgh RFC v Forrester FPs at Ardencaple playing fields kicks-off this Saturday at 3pm.