Despite the much improved draw, I'm afraid Haddington haven't
managed to qualify for the knock-out stages of the Province
Championships once again!
First game on Friday
was against the local Renfrewshire Province represented by Paisley St
Mirren Club. Despite having to cope with very different ice from
Murrayfield we took a 3 at the second end to lead 3-1. Unfortunately
that was the end of the good scoring from our point of view and duly
allowed Paisley to score a 3 back, followed by another 3. An end where
gambling took over went against us and we conceded a 5 so were now 12-3
down and game over - final score was 14-4.
Second game against
Forfar from Angus Province - they had a sub filling in and that poor
soul had noted the wrong timing and turned up 45 mins late! We won by
default with 6 shots and 5 ends I believe being the benefit as well as 2
points. This at least meant we had something to play for on Saturday.
Third
game was played on the Saturday against a strong Kilsyth team from
Stirlingshire Province. Once again we started really strongly, taking a 3
at the 1st and stealing 1 at 2nd end (maybe super-sub Hamish Logan
doing the trick!). Then, once again, our bubble was burst with some
missed strikes allowing Kilsyth to take a 4 and level the game at the
3rd. They then proceeded to steal a 2 and, although a saving draw to the
4-foot gave us a 1 at the next, we lost a 3 and a 2 to trail 11-5. The
last end saw us taking a 2 but too little, too late with Renfrewshire
beating Angus in the other game allowing them and Stirlingshire, as
unbeaten group leaders, through from our group.
Good
experience for all but a lot of chances not taken meant quite a
frustrating weekend for the Haddington CC team. Yester qualified from
their group and I've asked Balfour to give you an update of their
achievements which, at time of writing I don't know.
D.M.
