Highland shrugged off their recent run of three losses and thundered back into the title race by handing leaders Glasgow Accies their first defeat of the season.
Stuart McDonald, the Highland joint captain and number eight, hailed his side’s return to form and said:’ “Even when we were losing our morale never dipped. We are back in the promotion race and looking to move up the league after a great performance against a good side. Accies looked as though they were going to run us ragged early in the game.’’
McDonald stepped up to stop the enterprising Glasgow men, who when playing with the wind had taken a fourth-minute lead through centre Scott Simons.
Accies seemed on target to make it nine wins out of nine starts but McDonald took the play to the visitors, surging into the Accies 22 before shrugging off two defenders to score a match-changing try in the 20th minute.
Centre Scott Fraser rubbed salt in the wound with a splendid kick into the wind for the conversion.
Accies were never quite the same after McDonald’s try, although they did manage a second touchdown to go into the interval 10-7 up after another unconverted try for winger Jack McCready, but no doubt apprehensive about not having built a big enough lead to win the game.
So it proved to be as Highland launched wave after wave of attacks and it was no surprise when winger Mike Gordon raced over the Accies line to give his side the lead for the first time in 47 minutes. Fraser once again kicked the conversion, giving his team a 14-10 lead.
The same player added a penalty in 55 minutes from which there was no way back for the visitors.
Highland head coach Davie Carson said: “This was an important win for us. We are back on track, especially as all our nearest challengers have still to come to visit us. It was a great performance. We had standouts all over the place, including replacement prop Stuart Watson who was just tremendous. We will travel to Dalziel in the best of fettle after this one.’’