Both sides take a break from league business this weekend to take part in the BT Cup.

While Selkirk, who play GHA, are expected to rest a number of first team players, Peebles, who are on the road to Musselburgh, stressed they are keen to progress in all competitions.

Peebles captain Callum Scott said: “We’re definitely taking the Cup seriously this season, we want a good run in that. It will be a hard game against Musselburgh.

“But, looking at the season as a whole, we are an ambitious club, we want to push forward, we are looking for that promotion spot and I don’t see why we can’t get it. We just need to refocus and go again.” Reflecting on the Selkirk game, which also doubled as a Booker Border League match, Scott said: “Peter (Wright, Selkirk Head Coach) has got them going really well this season. We felt that we played our game quite well, just sometimes we couldn’t get that momentum that we needed.

“The scoreline is disappointing but we were in that game for the majority of it. We’ve just got to pick ourselves back up and keep going for next week.” Despite losing Ryan McConnell to an early yellow card, Peebles took the lead at the Gytes against a Selkirk side which is the only team in the top four leagues of Scottish rugby to remain unbeaten so far this season.

Greg Raeburn kicked a penalty for the home side in the 35th minute after the visitors were ruled offside.

However, Selkirk equalised the scores with the final kick of the ball in the first half when Josh Welsh kicked a penalty of his own, despite being a man short with Angus Duckett in the sin bin and having missed two earlier shots at goal.

The game suddenly sparked into life at the start of the second half when Callum McColm picked up the ball for Peebles inside Selkirk’s half and skipped past four tackles to go over for a try, with Welsh adding the conversion. And both before Duckett returned to the field of play.

To make matters worse for Peebles, on the hour mark, McConnell was given his marching orders when he was shown a second yellow for pulling down a Selkirk ruck.

And the visitors continued their push up the park to score another try, converted by Welsh, who completed the scoring with another penalty with eight minutes remaining.

With the result secured, new Selkirk signing Chaney Willems, from South Africa, came on as a late replacement despite featuring for the Seconds earlier in the day.

Peebles continued to press, but Scott, McCormick, and Matt Carryer were all stopped short of the line. It was Selkirk’s 10th league win in a row.

Speaking to the Border Telegraph pitchside after the full-time whistle, Selkirk man of the match Callum McColm said: “It was a very stuffy game, Peebles made it really hard for us, but we battled through, we defended well when they had pressure at the end, and we came out victors.

“It is always the same in Border derbies, but we didn’t expect to go 3-0 down. We made it 3-3 at half-time and we came back in the second half. After a good talking to at half-time, we came out and got the result.

“We’re really enjoying our rugby at the moment. (Peter Wright) is a big influence on us boys. We’re getting on great with him and hopefully we can keep it going.” Peebles coach Drew Moore admitted he was frustrated by decisions made by the referee. But insisted his side did little wrong.

“In terms of our guys performance, I can’t fault them at all,” he said. “The effort level that they put in was outstanding, but it’s really difficult to get momentum into a game when every little small incident on the pitch is getting blown up.

“And it’s just a lottery of decisions we’re getting from the referee today. I thought they were really poor. There was stuff that was just blatantly obvious they weren’t picking up, things like forward passes. It kind of spoils the game to be honest.

“It’s always going to be more intense in a Borders derby but we just played our normal game. There are lots of wee things that we can work on but there are huge amounts of positives that we can focus on then and see how it goes.”