The English are coming

Last weekend Fenton's Rink hosted a playdown to find the English Junior Champions who will represent their country in the European Junior Challenge at the Tårnby Curling Club, Copenhagen, Denmark, Jan 3-8. This competition is the qualifier for the World Junior Championships for those countries not already prequalified.

James Hustler was the Chief Umpire for the event and supplies the information below. I met some of these youngsters when I visited Fenton's for the Four Nations last season, so I was pleased to learn more on how they are getting on, and to share this on the blog.

All the results are here. The winners of the junior men's event was Ben Fowler's team above. L-R: Ben Alexander, Oliver Kendall, Ben Fowler, Harry Mallows.

Team Fowler defeated Jake Barker's team, above. Back: Miles Partridge, James Skidmore, Cormac Barry. Front: Jake Barker, Renz Bunag.

Jake's team is a product of the schools curling programme fostered at Fentons Rink with some of the local schools. This is their first season together as a unit and they're still getting a feel for the team dynamic. However with an age range of 14-16 and their current enthusiasm for the game there is potential for continuity as Ben's team ages and rolls out of junior curling.

Anna Fowler's team (above) won the girls' challenge. L-R: Naomi Robinson, Lauren Pearce, Angharad Ward, Anna Fowler, Hetty Garnier

Anna's team will go on to the European Junior Challenge in Tårnby in January. However it will be without Angharad who will be preparing for the Youth Olympic Games in Innsbruck.

Lucy Spark's team are all still at secondary school and under 16. Back: Sarah Decoine, Rebecca Watts, Lucy Sparks. Front: Niamh Fenton, Louisa Partridge. Lucy's team is a product of the Sunday junior academy which has been run by Forbes Fenton for the last three years at Fenton's Rink. This was their first ever competition so it was very much a steep learning curve for them. They certainly held their own in the second match against Anna, losing 6-5.

James says, "I don't think we're ready for the cry of 'The English are coming!' but the future is looking promising if we can nurture the talent and enthusiasm."

Photos are all © Rosaleen Boardman.

Scots win something at Fenton's

Well, Scotland's honour was at stake at 09.00 this morning. James Carswell, Stewart Sutherland, Jim Morrison and John McDermott had to 'not lose' by more than eleven shots and Scotland would have won the Tom Ballantyne Trophy. That's presented for the England v Scotland men's matches over five games. Going into this morning, four games played, Scotland were ahead.

Could our four musketeers do it. Scotland's honour was at stake. They had even gone to bed early... Early in the morning!

The mood on the mini bus out to the rink was sombre. Tensions were high.

The Scots face a strong England side. Phil Barton, above, was the skip, and he had Doug Andrews at third, Ivan Zadorzny at second and James Gibb, lead.

John McDermott and Stewart Sutherland sweep their wee hearts out on Jim Morrison's stone. Remember, this is 09.30, Sunday morning, not known as the traditional 'best time' for Scottish performances.

Did they do enough? Yes, they lost 3-6 to the English, but that was enough to ensure that the Tom Ballantyne Trophy is in Scottish hands for the next year. Well done to all who took part in the games! (Alastair McIntyre, Derek Cardiff, John McCall, Walter Barclay. Michael McCreadie, Stephen McClymont, Graeme Maguire, Gerry Crighton were the others who represented in this trophy competition.)

Laura Beever and Rosemary Biggart. The Scots lost this one against the Welsh this morning.

More reports later.

Pics © Skip Cottage

Fenton's Here I Come

I've visited every curling rink in Scotland but, to my embarrassment, I have never set foot in England's sole dedicated curling facility, Fenton's Rink in Kent.

That will be rectified this weekend as I plan to visit the rink when the Four Nations is on. I'll have my camera with me, of course.

It's not that I haven't followed our sport south of the border. The Scottish Curler featured a monthly column from John Brown in the seven years when I was Editor, and John continues to keep us up to date on what's happening in Toothy Tales. Recently he posted extensively from Prague at the European Junior Challenge. I was interested in how the English juniors performed. I met them when they played at the Lockerbie Junior event in December.

Minnie Garnier has sent me the photo below of some of the English youngsters, on their return from competing in Prague. The girls came sixth and the boys ninth, under the guidance of their coaches John Brown and Greg Dunn. They were sponsored by Kent Reliance Building Society.

The teams were: Girls - Anna Fowler (skip - not in photo as she was already back at university), Hetty Garnier, Naomi Robinson, Lauren Pearce and Angharad Ward. Boys - Ben Fowler (skip), Harry Mallowes, Ben Alexander (not in photo as back at uni), Oliver Kendall and Matt Spicer. Photo courtesy of Minnie Garnier.

A rink is only as healthy as its juniors, as I've said before, so every success to the growth of junior curling at Fenton's.

Now, I know what your next question will be. And no, I've not yet visited the Deeside Leisure Centre in Queensferry, Wales. However, I did find this recent YouTube footage here, which gives an idea of what it is like.

What else is there to follow this weekend? The second weekend of the Bruadar Scottish Men's Qualifiers is on in Perth. But only for Section A. Section B is on NEXT weekend. The draw, the results and the standings can be found here.

The Glynhill Ladies' International is at Braehead. Chistine and Hugh Stewart are the 'guest bloggers' for this. The event website is here.

Team North America with the Continental Cup. Photo credit: CCA/Michael Burns. Lots more photos here.

I haven't mentioned on the blog that Team World got completely flattened by North America in last weekend's Continental Cup. I did try to watch some of this from Aberdeen, but had no success in getting the webcast to work either with Firefox or with Safari on my Mac. Sandy Morton on Millport watched some of it and says it became embarrassing, so maybe it is as well that I couldn't connect. (Athough I would value some tech input into why I was unable to.)

Here are a couple of links which might give you a flavour. I enjoyed reading the Curling Librarian's behind-the-scenes thoughts and photos from the event here.

And World Curling TV now has its own YouTube channel. See here for an example, or click on the image below.

But do explore all the WCTV YouTube offerings (see here). Lots of archive footage is going up. I expect I'll be spending some time looking at it all in the weeks ahead!

Speaking of David Murdoch, his team (just who will no doubt become clear) is competing in the Casino Rama Skins event in Ontario. This is the big money competition which his team won last year. Murdoch v world champion Kevin Koe is one semifinal on Saturday. The battle of the sexes is the other, matching Kevin Martin against Cheryl Bernard, see here.