Ayr welcome Edinburgh Accies to Millbrae this weekend in a resumption of RBS Premiership competition after the excitement of winning the Glasgow Cup last week. It was a hard-fought victory for the men in pink and black, and in light of Accies' good win over Melrose, they will be focussing solely on this encounter, even if they are at the "business end" of the season, as Ayr's assistant coach Peter Laverie puts it.
"The coaches and players are only concentrating on this one match," he says. "We will need to play at our best to gain the all-important points but every ounce of preparation has gone into just that and the players know what they have to do."
Some of Ayr's rising stars return to club duty after international and Pro12 outings last week. Robbie Fergusson, who put in an impressive shift for Scotland under-20s on Saturday, starts on the wing. After his assured performance in his first Pro12 match for Glasgow Warriors on Sunday, Finn Russell is back at fly-half.
Nick Campbell, who also featured in the Warriors' entertaining victory over Zebre, returns in the second row, and the ever-popular Nick Cox has recovered from injury to start in the front row alongside Stuart Fenwick and last week's man-of-the-match Denford Mutamangira.
"Competition for places is high in the squad, with all our players desperate to get on the park," reveals Laverie. "This could be a real cracker of a game."
Team (subject to change on match day):
15. Grant Anderson, 14. Robbie Fergusson, 13. Ross Curle, 12. Dean Kelbrick, 11. Craig Gossman; 10. Finn Russell, 9. Peter Jericevich; 1. Denford Mutamangira, 2. Stuart Fenwick, 3. Nick Cox; 4. Nick Campbell, 5. Scott Sutherland; 6. Colin White, 7. Andrew Dunlop, 8. Calum Forrester (capt).
Replacements:
16. Hayden Wisnewski, 17. D'arcy Rae, 18. Ross Doneghan, 19. Graham Fisken, 20. Richard Dalgleish.
Kick-off 3pm.
EH
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