Southern Knights 26

British Army 14

David Morrison

at The Greenyards

FRIDAY night's friendly with the British Army drew arguably the Southern Knights' largest support so far.

And the encouraging sized crowd was treated to some enjoyable rugby from both sides.

But perhaps the most encouraging aspect of the evening was the debut performances from a few of the Knights' fringe youngsters.

Both Trystan Andrews and Liam Herdman scored terrific tries as they stepped into the semi-pro team for the first time.

It had been an encouraging start from the Knights that led to Shaun Gunn showing a swift turn of foot to sprint over from 10 metres.

Jason Baggot converted.

Despite further pressure it was the Army's defence who were impressing with strong tackling and occasional turnovers.

But Knights did add to their tally just before the interval as Ruaridh Knott broke through to offload for Andrews to dart over the line.

Baggot made it 14-0 with the kick.

The British Army team showed their own attacking abilities early in the second half with captain Jamie Miller bursting through a gap.

Smith's conversion brought the visitors back into the game.

But the comeback was repelled by some encouraging play from the Knights.

In the 68th minute Herdman delighted the crowd as he dummied his way through the defence to score under the posts.

Struan Hutchison slotted the conversion to regain the 14-point advantage.

The Army refused to give up and just five minutes later Hayworth powered over for another converted try.

In the closing stages, the soldiers were reduced in numbers as two quickfire yellow cards were flashed to their ranks.

And it was Michael Mvelase-Julyan who took full advantage of the space to race in at the corner.

Southern Knights: F Thomson, I Sim, J Jenkins, A Nagle, P Anderson, J Baggott, B Colvine, S Gunn, F Renwick, C Young, J Head, A Gregory, A Runciman, R Knott & D Taylor. Reps: R Ferguson, E McQuillan, G Shiells, C Crookshank, K Clark, S Hutchison, L Herdman, M Mvelase-Julyan, T Andrews & G Wood.