East Lothian gents saw their exciting revival in the race for indoor bowls premier league glory end in anti-climax with the stars of the garden county suffering a surprise 29 shot defeat away to relegation zoned Falkirk.
Read moreThe aim going into fixture nine of the 10 match campaign was to achieve a sixth win in a row that would keep up the pressure on Aberdeen who topped the B section table by two points but were showing signs of faltering having led EL by six at one stage.As it transpired Aberdeen did show continued signs of going into a late wobble but kept themselves at the head of affairs by scrambling a single shot victory (69-68) at home to foot of the table Lanarkshire.“I guess we blew our chances big time”, said East Lothian captain Mark Johnston “but unfortunately we came up against an inspired Falkirk team that was fighting for survival and made the most of their home advantage”. Given how high the stakes were for us also our level of performance was extremely disappointing lacking in consistency and quite simply we were beaten by the best team on the day”.“Aberdeen did come close to slipping up and still had a tough visit to Paisley to make but we can’t pinch top spot from them now although Paisley can still pip them at the post”, he added.The writing came on the wall early for an East Lothian team operating without two legendary figures in Alex Marshall MBE and Willie Wood MBE and there high morale and fighting spirit of recent weeks was shattered when faced with a massive 31 shot deficit (52-21) after 10-ends played.“In all honesty the picture didn’t improve for us in the second half of the match with another of our problems being unable to cope with the very challenging fastness of the Falkirk carpet” concluded Johnston.Trouble at the mill for the visitors started with the normally reliable rink of Ewan Fallen, Kieran Simants, Dougie Berwick and Billy Mellors crashing a heavy double figure defeat.And with Falkirk thirsting for a match victory that would lift them clear of the relegation zone the home team also dealt out punishing defeats to the rinks skipped by Derek Oliver, Jamie Higgins, and Scott Kennedy.
Meanwhile the continuing play in the Team Championship event saw East Lothian progress into the second round proper with a 6-2 points win over West Lothian IBC at Balbardie, and they next face Balbardie at Falkirk on Sunday February 8.The Garden County select is spearheaded by former Evening News Champion of Champions star John McCrorie in the Singles supported by Janet Dickson and Stevie Thomson (Pairs), Dee Hoggan, Andy Burt, and Tommy Young (Triples), Megan Kivlin, Gordon Pryde, Emma Brown, and Scott Logan (Fours).Balbardie – who had eliminated Midlothian in the prelim round – set up their clash against East Lothian with a good 6-2 win over Alloa at Livingston.