Away in the far corner of a packed Scotstoun, the illuminated digital clock struck 79 minutes. Edinburgh, for so much of this match second best to Glasgow Warriors, had a penalty close to the half-way line, left of the posts. Trailing by nine points, the temptation must have been to kick for touch and go for a try. The team’s co-captains had other ideas.

The ball was handed to replacement stand-off Jaco van der Walt and he belted the ball over the posts. Not an easy assignment, given the wind and rain. Edinburgh trailed by a converted try with one play left. They did not threaten the scoreboard again but made sure the deficit in the 1872 Cup is surmountable, only six points after a 16-10 triumph for Warriors, when the two teams meet at BT Murrayfield on Friday. It also ensured a losing bonus point in the URC standings.

This match wasn’t a classic. It was physical, bruising, played in difficult conditions. Both team crossed the whitewash once – Jack Dempsey for Glasgow, Connor Boyle for Edinburgh – but the difference was from the boot. George Horne and Tom Jordan landed their penalties for the hosts, Emiliano Boffelli narrowly missed both of his from distance. Those on the visitors’ bench can therefore be excused a moment of surprise when Grant Gilchrist and Jamie Ritchie opted to go for goal rather than chase a try late on.

"I was looking at the bench at the time and I was actually questioning it a little bit,” said Edinburgh second row Glen Young. “I thought we were going to run the full 80 minutes to try and score a try. But it’s actually smart thinking from Gilko and Jamie as captains. It was a great kick from Jaco before the 80 minutes were up, so it still gave us a chance to score after that. We had a good crack at it. It puts us in a better position for next week and it also gives us a losing bonus point.”

Edinburgh's Jaco Van Der Walt converts a late penalty in the 16-10 defeat by Glasgow Warriors at Scotstoun.

Edinburgh knew they were in for a rough ride at Scotstoun. Glasgow are strong in front of their own crowd and Edinburgh have found life tricky there recently. “It was a really tough game,” admitted Young. “We always knew that was going to be the case playing Glasgow at home. We haven’t won at Scotstoun since 2018. There are a lot of areas we need to improve for next week. But they are within our control in terms of the breakdown and stuff like that. We’ll be gunning for it going back to Murrayfield.

“We pride ourselves on our physicality. We knew the first half wasn’t good enough. The second half was a bit better after we addressed it at half-time. We just gave Glasgow too many chances in the first half. Any time we got into their 22, we just weren’t clinical enough in terms of coming away with points. We only came away with one try at the end of the night when we definitely had opportunities to score a few more than that. In big matches like this, that means winning or losing the game.

“Credit to Glasgow. They played well, defended well and slowed our ball down. They made a fight out of it. But we need to react to that and find ways of fixing that to impose our own game on them. We did that at Saracens and I’m sure we’ll do it next week.”

Glen Young hails Edinburgh duo's 'smart thinking' late on against Glasgow Warriors as 1872 Cup hangs in balance