We chat to Matt McMillan…
Anyone who has watched the 1st XV playing over the last fortnight can only have been impressed by what they have seen from skipper Stuart Allison and his young charges.
The team has now given themselves a fighting chance of staying up in Tennent’s National League Division One having backed up the victory away at Boroughmuir before Christmas with two bonus point home triumphs over Cartha Queens Park and Highland on January 15 and 22 respectively.
Before the team has a break in action until February 19, they play the third of three home matches on Saturday against Gala at Myreside at 3pm.
One of the players who has been performing very well for the team of late is stand-off Matt McMillan who recently turned 19.
He was named player of the match last weekend in the game against the men from Inverness and he said: “I am really enjoying my rugby with this bunch of boys at the minute.
“At the start of the season I was playing for Musselburgh, but I decided to make the switch to Watsonians a few months ago and I am so glad that I did.
“It has been really good working with head coach Jason Riley while the experienced players have been welcoming and there is a lot of talented young players in the squad too.
“I have enjoyed linking up with scrum-half Brodie Young, who I played with all through school at nine and 10 of late and we have a good understanding.
“Since the Boroughmuir game we have just built and built as a group and we have scored a number of tries and played good rugby in the last two weeks and we want to keep that going.
“Gala are a good side, but we are at home and we have to try and get on the front foot and have belief in our own abilities. This is an important game before a couple of weeks break.”
So, how did Matt, who lives with his family in Port Seton and is currently taking a year out before going to university in the Autumn, get into rugby in the first place?
“I started playing at Musselburgh and played all of my mini rugby there before I moved to go to school at George Watson’s College in S1,” he explains.
“From then on I played mainly school rugby and for the next few years I absolutely loved it. The coaching that we received helped us to learn about the game and it was fun playing with my friends.
“I used to play football for a club in East Lothian [Longniddry Villa] too, so at one point it was rugby on Saturday morning and football on Sunday afternoons plus lots of training. I then had to decide which sport to focus on and I chose rugby.”
It was a good choice because in 2018/19 Matt was captain of the GWC under-16s which went on to win the Scottish Schools Cup at BT Murrayfield.
He then went on the school tour to South Africa in the summer of 2019 - “an amazing experience” - and, in S5, started the first two games of the season for the GWC under-18s before breaking his leg against Dollar.
“That was in September 2019 and it was a big blow at the time,” Matt admits.
“The coaches at the school and my team mates helped me come to terms with it and I just worked hard to get back fit, but unfortunately the pandemic came in March 2020 and all sport stopped.
“It meant that my next rugby games weren’t actually until the end of my S6 year in 2021 when the under-18 school team managed to play a couple of friendlies.
“That wasn’t the ideal way to sign off from school rugby, but I am making up for lost time in senior rugby now and enjoy testing myself against good sides in National One.”
Words by Gary Heatly
Thanks to Graham Gaw for the photo, more here
