6th January, 2001

Last Sat saw Huntly play their first match of 2001 with a trip to Aberdeen to play Aberdeenshire 2nd XV, whose 1st XV play in National League 2.

This was always going to be a hard game but Huntly were further weakened with no fewer than 6 players unavailable due to work commitments and 1 out injured. However Huntly were bolstered by guest players, ex captain Marc Shand at scrum half and Donald Stewart at flanker. Both had excellent games.

The game turned out to be the real hard workout that the coaches wanted for the team before they return to league duty this weekend away to Peterhead. Huntly matched their more experienced opponents in all departments for the first hour and actually led on a number of occasions until two players were forced to leave the field with knocks and one forced off the field for "foul play". Shire were able to produce a replacement for Huntly but they played most of the rest of the game with 13 against 15.

Up until this point Huntly's defence had been coping well and there was only a few points difference. However the home side took full advantage of the extra numbers and space to run in a few easy trys to make the final score 39-20.

Huntly scored 3 trys during the match. The first from Robert Smart who powered his way through the home defence for the touchdown. The next was from No 8 Mark Borzoni who took a pass inside from Shand after hooker Robbie Williams had nipped a strike against the head at a Shire scrum. The third was from Williams who drove over from a close range ruck for his first try for the 1st XV.