Tuesday, 6 November 2018

West League Update (West 1) - 6th November 2018


At the start of October, Greenock Wanderers were unbeaten and joint top of West 1 with East Kilbride, Allan Glens were in fifth place 6 points behind.

In the following weeks, EK and Greenock swapped places almost every week, but this weekend they faced one another.  The entries to the Predictor Challenge showed the majority of us (nearly 73%) had Greenock down for the win.  Despite Greenock being big favourites, this game had the hallmarks of being a close fought contest.


It's the first time we'd seen Greenock play and we had been expecting a high scoring encounter, after all between them they had already amassed 600+ points this season, but a strong wind didn't really encourage chucking the ball about.

We watched plenty of phases of play, but not much of it getting beyond a crash ball off of 10.  Both teams had willing runners to smash the ball up round the fringes, but equally, both teams had defenders more than willing to make the big hit. It wasn't about smashing it up though, as two of EKs tries did come from getting the ball out to the wings.

At halftime, there were three points between them (15-12 in EKs favour), and going into the final 10 minutes EK had a 7 point advantage.  Greenock maintained pressure in the EK 22 for this closing phase of the game and scored in the corner in the final play.  The conversion would make it 22 points apiece, but it was a difficult wind to contend with.  Goal kicking had been tricky all day, so it was no surprise, and with much relief for the EK fans, when the kick drifted a bit wide, which meant EK had held on for a narrow victory.



Two strong teams, who had scored loads of points this season - there were three tries and a penalty each with the only difference being two conversions (well one was a penalty try) to one. So over the course of the month, despite some mixed results for both Clubs, there's only a point between them, with EK moving ahead in the table again.


With the top two playing each other, it was an opportunity for Allan Glens to take the lead in the title race.  Their hosts were Kilmarnock, who have picked up a few results in recent weeks, but a disappointing scoreline at Stewartry last week meant they were still only in ninth, five points ahead of the second relegation place (though significantly better than their position at the end of October).

Glens may have been expecting to add a decent chunk to their points for column, but the young Kilmarnock team are maturing fast and by all accounts put in a strong performance despite going down 25-13.  If Kilmarnock can keep up these performance levels, they'll be confident of closing the gap on 7th & 8th.

It might have been a narrow win, but the result means that Glens go top of the table, three points ahead of EK, and with a significantly stronger points difference.

Going back to the start of October, Garnock were in fourth place, five points behind the leaders.  Saturdays 35-15 win against Cambuslang means they are still in fourth place, but now only four points behind the leaders.  So whilst EK, Glens and Greenock have been making the running at the top of the table, Garnock have been quietly going about their business, picking up wins and bonus points.  All looking pretty tasty between the top 4, each have played nine games, and there are only four points between them.


We have a partial fixture card this weekend, with only Glens and Garnock of the top four in action.  Glens host Dalziel who ran Stewartry close at the weekend, losing only 22-29, but picking up a couple of bonus points in the process, whilst Garnock are hosting Stewartry, who only just scraped past Dalziel.  We're pencilling in wins for both Glens and Garnock, but with it being a home international, and early kick-offs, there may be a few changes to starting XVs which could add a bit of intrigue.

Dalziel are still bottom, but the couple of bonus points earned at the weekend could come in handy at the end of the season.  They drop further behind 11th place (but close in on 10th) as Endrick overcame Cumnock in a low scoring 17-3 contest, which puts Endrick on the same points as Cumnock, who were unable to pick up any bonus points.

Irvine continued to build on their strong home record, which included last weeks win against title challengers EK, with a 26-20 win against fifth-place Annan.  The win means Irvine jump ahead of Cambuslang and onto the same points as Annan, though Annan have a marginally better points difference and a game in hand.  Irvine have now won 5 home games from 6 (only losing to Garnock) and look like they will pose problems to all their guests at Marress.  Both Annan and Irvine are 11 points behind Glens, so we're guessing they're out of the title challenge.

Annan will be looking for a more favourable scoreline this weekend when they welcome Kilmarnock.  With only one win in their last four matches (and that by only three points against Stewartry), recent results are not in Annans favour.  They have definitely seen a drop-off in the level of their earlier season performances.  It's probably going to be a close one, so we should really stick to our rule about home advantage, but current form suggests to us this will be a Kilmarnock win.

In the final West 1 game this weekend, Cambuslang host Strathendrick.  Cambuslang are 11 points ahead of Endrick (five points of this difference comes from bonus points), but Endrick have a game in hand.  Cambuslang are scoring more, but also conceding more.  Both Clubs will view this as a must win.  If Cambuslang lose, they could find themselves dragged into the relegation battle as their next games are against East Kilbride and Greenock.  We're expecting this to be a close one, and this time we are sticking with our home advantage rule.

The race at the top of the table is tight, but so too is the relegation battle.  Dalziel are trailing, but results against bottom 6 Clubs aren't by massive gaps - a wee bit of confidence and we expect them to pick up some positive results.  With at least two teams going down this season, it certainly brings Kilmarnock, Cumnock and Strathendrick into play, and as we say above, Cambuslang could be drawn into this battle if they lose on Saturday.

Stewartry are in a similar position to Cambuslang, clear at the moment but the next month of fixtures could see them dragged into the relegation battle.  Garnock this Saturday is followed with a must-win game against Strathendrick, and then it's East Kilbride and Greenock.

The Autumn Test Series might be grabbing the limelight, but it's a crucial phase of the West 1 campaign where the results (and bonus points) will make massive differences to the title and relegation contests.
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