Rugby match to be played in honor of St Andrews Day

Scotland’s poor form in the Autumn Tests may be forgotten this Friday 30^th November as the 1^st XVs of the country’s most historic Universities, St Andrews and Edinburgh, clash in the annual Scottish Varsity fixture.

A match dating back a century and a half, this year London Scottish Football Club will play host to a unique rugby event older even than the famous Oxford-Cambridge blues rivalry (a game being held at Twickenham next Thursday).

Thousands are forecast to turn out to the Richmond Athletic ground in South-West London, to witness what St Andrews hopes will be a victory over their bitter rivals from the Capital. The Scottish derby which last year attracted a 1500-strong crowd, including high-profile names ranging from former rugby international Kenny Logan to, for some reason, noted songstress Alesha Dixon.

Alesha’s presence was, alas, not enough to stop Edinburgh locking out the Saints in a 32-0 romp, and vengeance is very much on the minds of this year’s St Andrews squad; a feeling that will only be exacerbated by a recent run of frustrating results, seeing the squad beaten by an inferior Orkney side in the RBS Caledonia Regional League and slipping to fourth place in the First Division to which they were promoted last year, but maintaining a respectable third in the BUCS Division 1.

The London game will showcase in front of alumni, friends and supporters of both Universities’ two teams of considerable quality, in part due to their valuable investment in coaching talent, evinced by the employment of full-time members of staff. St Andrews’ own Director of Rugby, David Ross, commented of Friday’s fixture that “this event shows the vision and professional attitude that both rugby programmes are delivering in their Universities”, and that “the potential to make this event one of the major rugby dates in the calendar is huge; for alumni living in the South East in particular, the game provides a great opportunity to celebrate St Andrew’s Day.”

As the world holds it breath, news has filtered in that Alesha Dixon will once more be in attendance at tomorrow’s historic clash, kicking off at London Scottish tomorrow evening at 7:30pm. For those of you lucky enough to have finished coursework for the semester, a St Andrews victory and accompanying trophy presentation by former British Lions coach Sir Ian McGeechan is expected to harbinger divers late-night revelry both in the capital and at home. Updates can be followed on the Facebook page.

Image courtesy of clintonrfchistory.com