West Lothian’s bid to make it four wins in a row in the Scottish Cities and Counties Championship for The Hamilton Trophy ended in unexpected grief in the shape of a 19 shot defeat (102-121) from Stirling County East at Bonnybridge.
Read MoreThe threat level posed by SCE had been flagged up to be high risk by their shock away win over East Lothian and that outcome was proved to be no fluke as they put WL to the sword on four of the six rinks. Wins on the rinks skipped by Andy Dunnett and Neil Speirs weren’t enough to stem the tide that engulfed Thomas Mann, Grant Logan, Steven Fleming, and Raymond Logan in damaging defeats. There was a grain of after match relief with the news that fellow section leaders Edinburgh & Leith had crashed to an 18 shot defeat at home to West Fife however East Lothian and Midlothian came menacingly back into the picture with wins over Fife (away) and Borders (home) respectively.
Deans is the home venue for this Saturdays crunch match against Edinburgh & Leith and the battle for supremacy could develop into an epic encounter with both teams driven by a desire to stay in contention for a top two qualifying place. Team manager Gordon Logan has decided to promote Jordan Pearce (Kirkliston) and Paul Sweeney (Newbridge) to form a new front end for Greg Logan and Steven Fleming at the expense of Frazer Muirhead and Andi Gray. Other fixtures in the East section are, West Fife V SCE at Abbeyview; Borders v Fife at Lauder; East Lothian v Midlothian at Haddington.
Play at Bonnybridge was interrupted by episodes of thunder and lightning that proved to be detrimental to the WL team effort but not Andy Dunnett who skipped Ewan Shearer, Scott Logan, and Calum Logan on an early run of 1, 1, 7, 5 to lead 14-1 then stayed on well to score a 30-17 win over M McCalley. Speirs showed promise of giving strong support when skipping Steven Forrest, Mark Allison, and Bryan Cooper into a 15-7 lead after 14 ends but were then hard pressed to deliver a 17-16 win over C Ross. Mann only managed to count at eight ends against S Hogg and in company with Calum Black, Gary Orr, and Gary Smith suffered a punishing 26-13 defeat. Grant Logan and his front- three of Jamie Edwards, Blair Mackie, and James Speirs were also restricted to counting at eight of their 21 ends as they slipped from 12-14 to a damaging 25-12 defeat from McFarlane. Fleming skipped Frazer Muirhead, Andi Gray, and Greg Logan into a 17-13 lead before collapsing to a 21-16 defeat from T Carberry- having counted at 10-ends. Raymond Logan and his rink of Darren Pearce, Barry Sword, and Sandy McDougall were piped 16-14 having scored at nine ends.
With some quarterfinals of the Scottish District Championships in West Lothian down for decision on Tuesday night the line up in the Singles us; Ratho v Uphall Station and Oakbank v Stoneyburn at Queensferry; West Calder v Linlithgow and Buchan Park v Newbridge at Pumpherston.
This weeks second round results were; Ratho 21 Armadale 20; Uphall Station21 Kinneil 13; Oakbank 21 Bridgeness 15; West Calder 21 Harrysmuir 18; Linlithgow 21 Bathgate 17; Buchan Park 21 Broxburn 13; Newbridge 21 Polbeth 6.
Play in the Purdie Worldwide Scottish Inter County Top Ten Tournament reaches its conclusion at Bainfield on Sunday and the line up at the Edinburgh venue is; 10am Semi Finals: Westhill of Bon Accord v Arbroath of Angus; and Castle Douglas of The Stewartry v Stanley of Perthshire— followed by The Final at 2pm.