Musketeers do it again!

Congratulations to Musketeers CC on their success in the Double Rink Championship, for the second year in a row, at the Stranraer Rink today.

Gail Munro reports that it was all to play for in the last end of the final games against Stranraer in the championship decider.

In the first game to finish, Jim Cannon (for Stranraer) had to hit and stick to win the game but rolled out and had to be content with a peel. Alan Chalmers (for Musketeers), who was two up playing the last without the hammer, had to remove a Stranraer counter with his final stone, half checked on one of his own. He picked it off perfectly to secure the win.

So what happened to my favoured teams representing Currie and Balerno CC? Well, all the results are here. Copey's Behind the Glass column tells the story of the weekend, and a few other things as well. A great read. I must send him on some more adventures. Can you just imagine him blogging from the Europeans, or the World Championships? Would that not be fun. John Brown AND Robin Copland in Moscow.

Top: The Musketeers. L-R (descending down the stairs)
Johnnie Munro, Angus Allan
Paul Baughan, Calum Macnee
Alan Chalmers, Graham Cormack
Gordon Addison, Iain Cormack

Photo courtesy of Gail Munro. Click on the image to see it larger.

Junior Qualifiers and the Double Rink

It's a big weekend for our juniors. Sixteen junior men's teams and twelve junior women's teams will battle it out in Ayr from Friday at 09.00 through to Sunday, to find the top eight teams in each category to play in the Scottish Junior Curling Championships at Curl Aberdeen, January 25-29. The prize then will be to represent Scotland at the World Junior Championships in Ostersund, Sweden, March 3-11.

But of course nothing is ever quite as simple as it seems!

The girls' event has two sections. According to what is posted on the Royal Club website here, the top three from each will qualify and the fourth placed teams will play off to find another qualifier for the Finals. But that only makes seven. It took me more than a moment to work out the reason. One team has already been given a bye to the Finals, that of Hannah Fleming. The competition rules say, "The Head Coach along with the Royal Club Sub-Committee for the competition reserves the right to apply automatic qualification to the Finals for up to four teams from each gender." The decision to give Hannah's team the bye is noted in the Minutes of the Competitions Committee, held on October 18, which are available to download from this page.

The boys' event has three sections, one with six teams, and two with five. No teams have been given a bye to the Finals. Until yesterday, the qualification outlined on the competition website looked to be rather odd. Three teams were coming out of sections A and B, with only two qualifying from Section C, the second of the five team sections. Fair? It didn't seem so. Information posted on the competition website yesterday now reads, "A change to the qualifying number has been made to the Men's qualifiers. Three teams from each section will now qualify for the Junior Finals. These finals will now start on Tuesday, January 24."

I interpret this to mean that the Junior Men's Finals in January will have nine teams, rather than eight.

Perhaps simpler to follow might be the Double Rink Championship which is at Stranraer! Twelve clubs, each represented by two teams, have qualified for the finals. You can follow the results here. Skip Cottage tries not to have favourites when covering such events, but in this case I have to declare an interest in the fortunes of Currie and Balerno CC, for reasons that will become clear in due course! Who's a tease then?

Double Rink at Stranraer

Bill Scott sends this report of the Double Rink Championship at the North West Castle rink:

"Despite the inclement weather throughout most of Scotland, nine clubs made it to Stranraer for the Double Rink Championship. Three clubs were unable to make it and a Stranraer team was assembled at the eleventh hour to form two sections, one of six and one of four teams.

After three rounds in each section, Dalry Union, Kilsyth, Musketeers and Reform qualified for the semifinals. In keenly fought matches Kilsyth and Musketeers reached the final.

Kilsyth 2 matched Musketeers 1 throughout to finish peeled after 8 ends. The second game was tight until the fifth end after which Musketeers had a strong finish to end 9 to 2 up.

After a very enjoyable weekend the Musketeers team of (Rink 1) Alan Chalmers, Hamish Lorrain-Smith, Calum Macnee, Angus Allan, and (Rink 2) Graham Cormack, Iain Cormack, Gordon Addison and Paul Baughan were presented with their prizes by Gail Munro of sponsors and hosts North West Castle Hotel. ASC representative Peter Lupton, presiding, suitably thanked all who assisted in the success of the event."

Well done to the Eight Musketeers, and thanks to Bill Scott for the pic of the winners. Click on the image to see larger size.