The Arnold Clark Premiership outfit have put together a new invitational sevens side, called Melrose 1883, to compete at tournaments overseas, starting later this month in Switzerland. This year’s Geneva International Sevens take place on Saturday and Sunday, June 21 and 22, and the Greenyards club will fulfil a long-held ambition by taking part for the first time. Their 12-strong squad, to be coached by Iain Chisholm, co-head coach with Scott Wight of their XVs side, won’t be confirmed until next week but it will be a 50-50 split of Melrose players and guests from Ayr, Edinburgh’s Heriot’s, County Durham’s Darlington, Durham University and Spain’s national sevens team. Team manager Doug Crawford, also Melrose’s general manager, says the aim of the new team is to represent the club that invented the short-sided game 142 years ago on the world stage and they’re hoping to be able to compete at high-profile events such as the Hong Kong Tens and United Arab Emirates’ Dubai Sevens in years to come, funding permitting. The Borderers will be taking a 15-strong party to Geneva made up of their dozen players, Crawford, Chisholm and physiotherapist Amy Inglis. “It’s something we’ve always wanted to try and do at the club to take the legacy of the home of sevens on the road and compete at tournaments overseas,” explained Crawford. “We often get invitations to places like Hong Kong and Dubai but we’ve never been able to take them up, just due to funding. “We’ve got to make sure this is a self-funded entity paid for by sponsorship and fundraising. “Geneva presented itself as a cost-effective way to launch a team, though, because the tournament provide hotel accommodation, so that saves a big expense. “It’s something we’ve alway wanted to do and now we’re doing it, we’ve got some ambitious plans for the 1883 team in the future. “This is us dipping our toe in the water to see how we get on as it should be quite a tough competition. “We’ve played in tournaments overseas before – we played at Gibraltar Sevens a couple of years ago – but not with this sort nof concept of a touring side made up of Melrose and guest players. It’s a new concept in that regard, having a Melrose-branded invitational team. “We’d love to get out to something like Hong Kong Tens next year but it’s just about seeing how things progress. “Everyone’s very excited about going to Geneva. It’ll be a tough competition but it’ll be good to put the home of sevens on the map and take it over to Europe. “Hopefully we’ll make some good connections while we’re out there and we’ll give it our best shot.” Melrose will be one of eight teams competing at Geneva’s Cherpines Sports Centre. The others are a side from French Top 14 club Toulouse, England’s Scimitar Storm, host team Switzers, Georgia’s SC Armia, Italy’s Friuli-Venezia Giulia Gladiatori, Poland’s Winged Hussars and Spain’s Viator Barbarians.