West have only bonus point to take from trip to the south side

Whitecraigs v West of Scotland - Scrum-half Alex Fisken makes a break.

The home side, whose good results earlier in the season had tailed off, ran out 47-27 winners in a high-scoringe BT National Division 2 encounter.

West started brightly and a series of driving mauls brought down illegally saw a penalty try converted by Jack Urquhart to give them a 7-0 lead.

Whitecraigs came to life and a period of pressure saw scrum half Tony Sprangers sneak over. The conversion was missed and West still led 5-7.

But a rapid Whitecraigs break which West couldn’t stop found Michael Christine scoring, Neil Alexander adding the extras.

West hit back straight away, a quick lineout finding Mark Sim who passed to Alex Fisken and he found Mark Jenkinson who offloaded for Calum Booth to score in the corner.

With no conversion the match was tied at 12-12 but an Alexander penalty put Whitecraigs back into the lead.

Things started to turn the home team’s way. An attempted shovel pass instead found Whitecraigs out half William Slumbers who ran in unopposed and an easy conversion made it 22-12.

Just before the break an excellent Ross MacAulay penalty brought it back to 22-15 but Whitecraigs scored another penalty just after the interval and then a very slow West defence allowed home winger Connor Drummond to chip over the defence and collect his own kick to score the bonus point try.

West then got the driving maul working. It was brought down illegally twice, the second time after a 20m drive, then Fraser Smeaton scored off the base of yet another maul to make it 30-20.

Whitecraigs managed to escape without a yellow card but Smeaton was carded for a penalty after a team warning.

Whitecraigs scored from the penalty and as they piled on the pressure Darren Allen was then yellow carded for a professional foul, making it 15 v 13.

Inevitably, giant lock Ross MacDonald rumbled in to score from the resulting tap penalty and then scored again as Whitecraigs were now dominating.

After a Whitecraigs yellow card Fisken managed to sneak over for a try converted by MacAulay but there was no more scoring.

West remain mid-table but will have to improve defensively on this evidence.

This Saturday they are back on the south side of Glasgow at Cartha Queen’s Park.