Some Reflections on the Scottish Curling Championships

Sadly, I was only able to make the Saturday sessions.  See travelling on business?  Nightmare!  Anyhow, up we went to Perth, there to watch things and dream of times past.

I don’t know about anyone else, but I always find it very difficult to support one team.  It was easier in olden times when teams represented ice rinks and comprised typically local players.  The Torrance rink was from Hamilton and the Hay rink from Perth; if the skips name was Adam or Horton, chances were that they were from Glasgow and the Hendersons were Aberdeen born and bred.  So, if you went to Dundee or Perth or Kirkcaldy, there to watch the Scottish Championship finals in February, you had “your” team.

Now – it’s a nightmare!  Four of us decided to sit in the bleachers and concentrate on the Ewan MacDonald v David Edwards 3 v 4 page play-off game.  We dutifully walked twixt one end and the other, better to see the head at close quarters.  I will tell you that the other three were Bob Kelly, Bob Cowan and Ken Horton.  Alan Durno, who had taken his customary place close to the bar servery up the stairs, saw this sorrowful, stooped and regular procession and immediately christened us “the four coffin dodgers”; a bit harsh, I thought, but there we were.  Back and forth we went, talking about old times, chewing on various cuds and watching a splendid game of curling. 

So who was I supporting?  Well, I know, like and respect all eight of the players we were watching.  Some I know better than others, but to be honest, I did not want to appear heavily in favour of one team or the other, so I just applauded everyone and everything and thought to myself “may the best team win” on the day. Which really didn’t help the atmosphere too much.  You don’t want a bunch of neutrals in a sports crowd!

Now – do I want to go back to the old days where, believe this or believe it not, entries to the Scottish Championships were controlled by ice rink managers?  Obviously not; it was a ludicrous situation.  But, on the other hand, we have lost something of the “partisan” support that goes so much to defining the atmosphere at the Canadian Brier or Scotties Championships, for example and that used to be such a feature of the Scottish Championships, when crowds of well over a thousand keen curling fans packed the old ice rink arenas and supported their favourites.

I do think that the Scottish is a defining championship for both men and ladies; as I have written before, it sorts out the men from the boys (with apologies to the ladies – but you get what I mean).  That is why it is so distressing to me that the entries were so low this year – especially in the ladies competition.  It seems to me that the high up-front cost of entry stops a lot of teams that might consider throwing their hat into the ring from doing so.  Also to be considered is the amount of time that most competitors need to take as holiday.  The competition has grown arms and legs and (perhaps this is an unfortunate analogy given the subject matter) but it has grown like topsy into a competition on steroids!  A whole week, for goodness sake.

A rethink of the format is required so that teams can dip their toes in the water without risking literally hundreds of pounds.  I know that a number of people have thoughts on this and some ideas will be aired in the near future.  I will not steal their thunder, but change there has to be.

As to the winners of the two competitions, both teams will represent their countries with pride, passion, commitment and no little skill.  Whether they medal or not will depend on all of those facets as well as a liberal dose of lady luck’s gifts.  There are no minnows now at World Championship level and both teams will need to be at the peak of their form to win.  Winning is in both of their pedigrees though, so good luck to them both and safe travels to Halifax (men) and Sapporo (women).

Anyone need some negotiating consultancy help in either venue, by the way?  I’m your man!  Usual fees apply.

Pipelines and Things

It is fair to report that our sport has enjoyed great success at recent Olympic, World and European events.  You may well argue that it has never been healthier and that we live in a golden age of success.  If you look at the international achievements of the likes of Anna Sloan, Greg Drummond, Michael Goodfellow, Scott Andrews, Tom Brewster, Claire Hamilton, Vicky Adams, Lauren Gray, Eve Muirhead and David Murdoch – to name but ten, and in no particular order – well, you cannot really argue.  These people have been prepared to commit wholly to their sport; they have given up huge amounts of time and effort and, yes, they are living their dream. But the rest of us should never forget that they didn’t achieve this success by accident: they visit the gym regularly; they put in as much work to their sport as the rest of us do to our jobs and, though the highs are undoubtedly high, they come at a price.

Such is the lot of any top sportsperson in the UK today.  You want to get to the top?  Commit.  End of.  And when there is lottery money available to fund all of the coaches and support staff, then that is fine.  Sorted, in fact.

It is up to the sport’s governing body to do the next bit.  I am going to call it “the pipeline”.  The pipeline is important for two immediate reasons

·       The top chaps need to be kept on their toes; they need to be kept “honest”; they need to know that if they slip – even fall – then there will be someone else in the wings willing and able to leap into their place.

·       There needs to be a succession plan in place; we need to think long-term.  It is all very well thinking of these top players as being long-term solutions, but life is about change, so there needs to be a Sarah Reid willing to step into the shoes of a departing Claire Hamilton, for example.  Oh.  There was; so that’s OK then as well.

To be serious for a second, we actually do have at least a couple of teams in both ladies and men that are serious challengers for the Scottish Championships this year.  I am thinking of the likes of teams MacDonald, Brewster and Edwards in the men and Gray and Fleming in the ladies.  Any one of these teams should have been exposed enough to top-level competition (as well as being serious, regular visitors to the business ends of our national championships) that, if push comes to shove and they find themselves representing their country at World or European level – well, they should be able to make a fist of it. 

Last season, in the controversial absence of the two Olympic teams, teams Barr and MacDonald came out top in their respective Scottish Championships and went to the World Championships.  Unfortunately, neither team threatened the podium, but the experience gained will always be there in the memory banks if the same thing happens again.  

Earlier this season, Teams Edwards and Muirhead won the European play-off in Scotland and therefore took on the far more perilous trip to the European Championships.  For team Muirhead, this was all grist to the mill but for team Edwards, this was their first outing on the serious international stage (with apologies to sundry Junior and European Mixed Championships) and the stakes were high indeed – qualify Scotland for the World Championships.  As the week ground on, the wee Andrex puppy was becoming increasingly agitated, but they came through in the end – as did the ladies with a Bronze medal win over Denmark, their slightly surprising conquerors in the 3v4 play-off game.

So – a story of mixed success then and I think that there are some learning points here for the HHYs.  I’ll bullet-point them as follows

·       The Scottish Championships remain an important calendar event and the stakes in this open competition should remain high.  Bottoms should squeak.  Top teams need to be kept “honest”.

·       Serious competition is important, so ensure that you have at least two “other” teams that can step up to the plate.  This means funneling funds in their direction as well and sending them off to at least three Champions Tour events in the period September to December/ early January.

·       Maintain the age-group championships, but let the youngsters pick their own teams until at least age 18.  Let them enjoy competing with friends; allow them the space to become enthused with the game before you channel them inexorably into teams when they are still too young.

There’s other stuff as well, but that will do for the moment!

Sorry that it has been quiet here for so long and many thanks to those of you whom I have met in my travels and who have encouraged me to take up the fingers again. 

More later.

BBC Sports Personality of the Year

For some reason, BTG's invitation was lost in the Christmas rush post.  Tssk, tssk, BT, whatever were you thinking?

This has got BTG into a curmudgeonly mood.  Normal service will be resumed next week.

Batten down the hatches, curling HHYs, I'm coming after you again!

Grrrr....!

Stones of Destiny!

It is 1972 and we are deep into the final of the World Championship in Garmish-Partenkirchen.  Orest Meleschuk knows that he has to hit and stick within the eight-foot on tricky, heavy ice to score two and take the game into an extra end.  His opponents were team USA, skipped by Bob LaBonte.  Their round-robin records were Canada 7-0 and USA 4-3.  Never was there such a mismatch, yet here we were – it all depended on the big fellow’s last stone.

Cigarette dangling from his lips, he threw his fateful stone; the sweepers give it an early bang with their corn brooms, but the stone suddenly sits back and they are called off quickly; contact is made, but the shooter rolls slowly out towards the eight-foot; and further out; and further out - helped on its way by some furious sweeping from the American third, Frank Aasand.  Finally, it comes to rest, close to lying second, but was it?

Slowly, Dave Romano, the Canadian third moves to look at his skip’s stone.  In his heart of hearts, he must have been worried, but he takes a long hard look despite his opposite number’s celebrations.  Skip LaBonte, taking his cue from Aasand’s leaps of joy, started his own macabre victor’s dance.  The camera cuts to the American front end, who are running down the ice in celebration just as LaBonte begins his tumble.  Don Chevrier pauses mid-sentence as the Americans continue their celebrations, because the unthinkable has happened; LaBonte has slipped and kicked the Canadian stone before Romano has had a chance to either concede or call for a measure.

There is confusion in the commentary box.  With the benefit of hindsight, of course, there should have been none.  The stone had not been measured and Canada had not conceded the game.  Eventually the stones are cleared and the extra end is played.  Meleshuk plays a nice come around a centre guard, though he sits at the back of the one foot.  LaBonte’s attempted draw to face it – predictably in the circumstances – was high, wide and not so very handsome.  The Canadians go home as undefeated World Champions.  The USA, who in their own minds were World Champions for about 7 seconds were left to lick their wounds and think about what might have been.

In the great scheme of things, it wasn’t so much a stone of destiny as a salutary lesson to all curlers everywhere.  Neither team made it back to the World Championships but what, at first, was destined to be a footnote in the history of our great sport began to develop wings and gradually, people began to talk about the “curse of LaBonte”.  It is a fact that Canada did not win a World Curling Championship for the rest of that decade.  Given their dominance in world curling hitherto, it was astonishing!

Then we go the Olympic semi-finals in Japan in 1998.  The GBR ladies are up against Sandra Schmirler who, until this point in the competition had really dominated.  The semi-final was against GBR, skipped by Kirsty Hay, with the Loudon sisters and Jackie Lockhart; no mugs and, truth to tell, they really made the Canadians work hard for their victory, so much so that with Schmirler’s last stone in the extra end, she was facing two GBR stones – albeit with the full eight foot to draw to.  As it crossed the hogline, it’s fair to say that, to use a lovely old Scottish phrase, “it was fully there”!  There was backing, but the line was high and let’s just say that Edith Loudon got her brush to it and had a good sweep, before it stopped – agonisingly beating the GBR stone by inches.  From the semi-final to the bronze medal play-off game – and that is surely the worst one of all to lose; sadly, that is exactly what happened for GBR against the Swedes.

Fast forward a few more years to the Olympic Games in Pinerolo; exactly the same stage in the competition, though this time the GBR men – David Murdoch, Ewan Macdonald, Warwick Smith and Euan Byers are tied at 3-3 coming into the tenth end of a tight, nervy tussle against Markku Uusilpaavalniemi’s Finnish champions.  The Finns hold the crucial last stone.  GBR is lying at 9.00 fully in the four foot and corner frozen against a Finnish stone.  David, with his last stone, plays the perfect shot to about 6.30 at the front of the four foot covering the one foot and forcing Markku to the cold out-turn draw to the button.  The GBR boys must have felt quietly confident.  U15 had to bite the button, whilst coming tight to the guard just laid by Murdoch.  But there was nothing they could do except watch as the stone came perfectly to rest on the button with barely a sweep by the front end.

Heartache twice!

But then you have Rhona Martin’s stone of destiny; enough said!  A month later, Jackie Lockhart’s nerveless hit on a straight piece of ice against Colleen Jones’ Canadian team to win the World Championship.  David Murdoch’s “stone of retribution” – the raised double take out against his pals, Thomas Ulsrud’s Norwegian team in the Sochi Olympics.

You win some; you lose some.

But spare a thought for Labonte and his mates; that’s a lifetime of heartache right there.

In Defence of the Scottish

Actually, it all started with a miss by one of the five against the other four.  Otherwise the four would never have become five and, I suspect, we would have had a different team at the recent Winter Olympics.  Confused?  Let me explain.

It is February 2011 at Perth ice rink and the Scottish Championship is approaching its denouement.  In the semi-final, Tom Brewster is skipping a team of young hopefuls – a couple of whom wore the same kind of scars as their more experienced skip had in abundance.  Both Greg Drummond and Michael Goodfellow had recently aged out without winning the Scottish Junior Championship.  Their last chance had been against the Ally Fraser team, with Greg’s brother, Kerr at lead. 

Anyhow.  Back to the semi-final; Tom and company had put up a good fight, but they were up against David Murdoch, with Warwick Smith at third, Ross Hepburn at lead and – Glen Muirhead at second.  David had last stone advantage.  I was behind the barrier and saw the whole thing unfold.  With the skips’ stones to play, here’s what I wrote.

With Tom’s first stone in the fateful last end, he attempted to draw round a short guard but was light and came up short.  David attempted a difficult double clear, but was about an inch tight and ended up clearing Tom’s two guards but left his own shooter in play and covering the edge of the four foot.  Tom’s out-turn draw was perfect and bit a piece of the one foot, showing maybe three-quarters of a stone.  David elected to play the cold draw to the one foot, though he knew that he had a bit of backing with Tom’s stone on the tee line.  Meat and drink.  He slid down to the far end, conferred with his front end – strong sweepers both, settled in the hack, concentrated and began his delivery.  Warwick Smith’s brush was almost exactly where Greg’s had been a couple of minutes before.  David slid out – he seemed to be sliding ever-so-slightly tight from where I was, but that could have been an illusion.  In any case, he released and from there, it was down to Glen and Ross.  Except it wasn’t.  Maybe ten yards along its path, David just dropped his brush and looked heavenwards.  He knew already.  The sweepers stayed close.  Warwick shrugged and shook his head – he knew.  Still the sweepers stayed close, but in their hearts, they knew too.  Handshakes all round.  I looked at Glen.  I knew how he felt.  Shell-shocked.  If you haven’t been there, my friend, you will never, ever know, is all I’m telling you.  Glen’s been there a few times.  He knows.  He will be stronger for it, though that particular platitude wears thin with him at the moment.

Tom, Greg, Scott Andrews and Michael went on to beat Moray Combe in a tense final and then won Silver at the World Championships.  The next year, they repeated the feat – losing a tense World final to Canada’s Glenn Howard and that summer following, the four became five when David Murdoch joined the team.

Question: would anyone have picked Tom and his team to go to the World Championships that year?  I’ll answer that one for you.  No.

Would anyone have picked Ken Horton in 1977?  No.  Mike Hay in 1984?   No.  David Murdoch in 2003?  You’re getting the picture.

Maybe my point is even more tellingly made if we look at the ladies game.  Rhona Howie.  Would anyone have picked Rhona anytime?  No.  She doggedly came back for more heartache after more heartache; she was Mrs second-place Howie year after heart-breaking year.  She was like a punch-drunk fighter coming back for more.  And she kept coming back and finally, splendidly, magnificently, she claimed her Scottish Championship.  She proved herself in the cauldron of competition and did enough to get picked as the GBR skip in the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics.  Rhona Martin, Debbie Knox, Fiona MacDonald, Janice Watt and Margaret Morton.  What a team of losers they turned out to be.

I am hearing and reading it all over again.  Let’s have picked teams for the World Championships; let’s downgrade the Scottish Championship to a second-rate competition.

Let’s not bother, shall we?  Let’s look at history.  Pay attention, people; we have a jewel in our crown.  Keep it polished.

 

Robin Copland

Sochi's on my Mind (part two)

Well; the dust has settled on the round-robin competitions and we enter the play-off phases of the competition with the semi-finals.  In the ladies competition, Canada find themselves in that most unenviable of positions: top of the table, but about to face arguably the top team in the competition - our own GBR team skipped by Eve Muirhead.

If we are truthful, the girls have struggled a bit and there has been some careless shot-play.  5-4 is not what was expected at the start of the week though, and to be very fair, the losses have typically been in tight, tight games.  We approach the business end of the competition; I like our chances.  Eve seems nerveless when she throws these big, big shots towards the end of her games.  She has a wonderful temperament.  If Anna, Vicky and Claire can set things up for her, she will finish them off.

David Murdoch, by the way, really needs to start sending Christmas cards and gifts to Rasmus Stjerne Hansen (not a name for the faint-hearted!).  Not once, but twice, he has ridden to GBR's rescue - first with a bit of a miss with his last stone against the British boys earlier on in the round-robin, then with a great (and somewhat unexpected) win against Norway in the final game.  That win set the play-off game up; had Norway won their game, then it would have been curtains for the GB men.

I really liked the way that the GBR men went about their business and as for David's last stone - have a look at it again on the iplayer!  All I'm saying.  Brilliant!

Men v Sweden and women v Canada.  Business end of the competition.  Bring it on!

Sochi's on my Mind!

It’s not far away now!  There are ten GBR curlers’ hearts beating just that little bit faster as Monday approaches.  Their support teams will be gathered around them – holding hands; supporting; encouraging.  The coaches will be focusing their charges on the struggles ahead.  The clock keeps ticking down.

For some, this is not a new experience.  Both skips have been here and done that in Olympics past – in David Murdoch’s case, not once, but twice.  He has come agonisingly close – who will ever forget Uusilpaavalniemi’s draw to the corner of the one foot in the Pinerolo semi-final eight years ago to snatch victory from the GBR team?  They went on to lose to the Americans in the 3 v 4 play-off but, interestingly, went on that year to win the World Championship – a chance denied them this time around.

Eve, as a young and raw 19 year-old went to Vancouver as skip of a strong GBR ladies team – Jacqui Lockhart at third, Kelly Wood at second and Lorna Vevers at lead, with fellow-golfer Annie Laird as alternate.  They lost more than they won, but many of the losses were tight, tight affairs and she will have learned from the experience.

This time around, I like the look of both teams.  I think that both have great chances of podium finishes – with perhaps the women looking the stronger of the two in their group.  That said, there are a goodly number of strong ladies teams.  GBR start with a game against their nemeses, the Swedish ladies; tough opener, this one.  You look at this Swedish team and think that they are there for the taking; but they are dogged and the sum is very definitely stronger than the parts. 

On Tuesday, they play the USA in a game I expect them to win.  Then on Wednesday, they have a big game against Jennifer Jones from Canada.  Jones has made a habit of winning Canadian championships for fun but, strange to report, this is her first go at the Olympics.  This would be a great game for Eve and company to win!  Jones has one only World Gold to her name – and that was in front of a home crowd in Vernon.  Get the win in early.  Let the Canadians sweat a bit!

Mind you, two of the first three games are tough, tough affairs – and, by the way, I don’t expect the USA to be pushovers either!   

China, Japan, Korea will be doughty opponents.  In round seven there awaits the 2012 World Champions, the Swiss skipped by Mirjam Ott.  The GBR team has two round-robin games after their match against Ott, one against the stuffy Russians in front of a home crowd, and finally they play Denmark.

Look, a game of curling can go either way and, more often than not, will hinge on one or two great stones or marginal misses.  Our team is good though – really good.  Yes, they will have a target on their backs as the current World Champions, but there is a presence about them on the ice and the other teams know just how good they each are.  With David Hay as their coach, a man for whom they all have the utmost respect, I expect them to reach the semi-finals and I hope that they get the wee rubs that Rhona Martin got all those years ago and David Murdoch didn’t get in Pinerolo.  I think that the four semi-final places go to Canada, Sweden, Switzerland and GBR.  GBR for Gold!  There you go; I’ve said it!

Now to the men.  They have the honour of opening their campaign against the Russians.  I like the fact that they get the Russians early, before the crowd has settled down.  I think that their second game is also a good one for them against a strangely out-of-sorts but current World Champion, Niklas Edin.  Germany, Switzerland, USA and Denmark follow and I am really hoping that, by this time, they are on a 6-0 or 5-1 record, for the next two games are the tough ones, and they come one after the other.  Canada, skipped by Brad Jacobs with a really strong third in Ryan Fry, look the class of the field to me; Norway, whom GBR face in the next game, are perennial podium finishers.  The GBR men finish their round-robin with a game against China.  I hope that they have done well enough for it not to matter!

I think that the four semi-finalists in this field are Canada, Norway, GBR and Sweden.  I say that because the GBR team has a pretty strong record in recent World and European Championships – two Silver medals and two Bronzes.  There was a time when David Murdoch had the Indian sign over Norway’s Ulsrud, but that time has perhaps passed.  If I were a man who prayed, I think I would want Sweden in the semi-final – and then may the best team win the final!  Can the men make it a golden double for GBR in the curling?  We can dream, but I think a more realistic colour is either Silver or Bronze – depending on whom they face in the semi-final.  I can’t see past Canada for the Gold – but I want the lads to prove me wrong and I promise that my face will be covered in poached egg (the healthier option, after all!), when they come back to Blighty with a Gold medal around their necks.

Best of luck to them all.  They all deserve our 100% support.  The games are all on the BBC red button service and you might find this link useful.

Warhorses, Turks, or Pretenders? You Decide!

Oh – I’m looking forward to the Scottish finals this year and no mistake!  Yes, I am disappointed that the Olympic fivesome will not be there to defend their title.  I think, if I am frank, that it demeans the Scottish as the premier competition in Scotland that a team has to forego playing in and defending their national championship.  I am disappointed also because the winning team will always have that wee question mark against their win.  But hey – remember Randy Ferbey?  He won a good few of his Brier titles in the absence of Kevin Martin and Glenn Howard, to name but two – but does anyone question his place at the legends’ table?  No; so let’s not cry too much over the spilt milk and let’s also remember that Sochi will be on their minds!

But back to the Scottish.  You can only beat those put in front of you and the winner will have played well and be worthy champions.  So who’s who in the final field of ten at the Dewars Centre, Perth from Monday 10^th to Sunday 16 February (cue the usual and annual bleat from me about stringing things out, asking people to take too much of their hard-earned holidays, etc., etc.!).

First of all, I like the look of the field.  It has a balance to it – a balance of youth, commitment, experience; it is actually like a field in the Scottish from thirty years ago; and anything that reminds me of my up-and-coming (then – not now!) youth is to be considered “a good thing”!  Why do I write that?  Look at it this way.  You have three teams, McCleary, Hamilton and Combe that have been around the block a few times, that are enjoying a little bit of an Indian summer in a couple of cases, that curl together because they like each other and play for fun.  Some have been through the squad system; a few have challenged for Scottish titles in the past; many have been committed activists in the competitive game – and they all deserve their place in the sun.

Of those three, the McCleary team perhaps has the best chance of causing an upset or two amongst the more established or better known teams.  All are capable on their day of beating anyone and I think that they will all finish respectably.  The key thing for me is that they all enjoy their experience.

Then you’ve got the old warhorses – teams Macdonald and Smith.  Ewan has brought in a fine young curler, Dave Reid, at second.  He has Duncan Fernie at third and specialist lead, Euan Byers.  I saw Ewan and Euan throw in the European Mixed Championships in Murrayfield at the start of the season.  I thought that they should have won the competition and believe me when I tell you that team MacDonald could go all the way.

The same is true, obviously of Warwick and his merry band.  They have also had a change of player in the second position and have brought in Carnoustie’s own Sandy Reid to throw the second’s stones.  He threw top end in the team that ran Tom Brewster so close in his maiden Scottish victory three years ago.  David Smith and Ross Hepburn fill the third and lead positions.  Believe me when I tell you that team Smith could – have I not said that already about another team?

But what about the young Turks, teams Smith (Kyle), Hardie and Fraser?  Kyle, the reigning world junior champion and his team of Thomas Muirhead, Kyle Waddell and Cameron Smith all have the pedigree and the chutzpah.  They thrive on competition.  They are arrogant and confident in their own ability.  They could do the double – though I would perhaps rather that they didn’t.  It’s a big ask to go to two separate world championships and peak for both.

Team Hardie has Jay McWilliam (note to the Royal Club; his name has no “s” in it!  He is a single “McWilliam”!), Hammy McMillan and Billy Morton.  They all have the talent and are specialists in their own positions.  Hanging around their necks though – and it seems strange to say this of youngsters in their early twenties – is the tag of “nearly men”.  They have come up short a couple of times in the finals of major championships; could this be their year to get that monkey off their backs?

Ally Fraser also has a strong team in front of him, with a bit of experience at second where the excellent Neil Macarthur will keep a calm head.  This is a new team, put together this season, though Blair Fraser and Ruairidh Greenwood played together last season.  Ally himself proved in the final of the Scottish Junior a couple of years ago that he has the big shots in his pocket.  But I think that winning the Scottish in this field may prove too much for them this season.

Which leaves the Pretenders, Teams Logan Gray and David Edwards.  Personally, I think that the champion comes from one of them.  Both have experienced players down the rink, who have specialised and are top curlers.  Logan has Glen Muirhead, Ross Paterson and Richard Woods.  David has John Penny, Scott Macleod and Colin Campbell.  David and his team won the Edinburgh International in November and Logan won the Perth Masters in January.  It is evenly poised between these two teams, in my view.

Mortgage time?  Well, maybe Logan; they do more curling; they wear more outrageous clothes and they have recent form at Perth.  Oh, but then maybe David, who has been knocking at the door for longer and has a more consistent record in the Scottish.

Cigarette papers, me thinks.  Two fine teams.  And the others aren’t too bad either!

The Runners and Riders in the Scottish Ladies Championship

Now, here’s a rum thing.  Hot on the heels of my thoughts on falling numbers, tippex-scribbled laptops and recruitment officers, I have just taken a look at the 2013-2014 Scottish Ladies Championship runners and riders.  You would have thought, would you not, that, in the absence of the reigning Scottish and World champions (and that’s another discussion), the cream of Scottish Ladies curling might have thought to themselves, in a moment of blinding logic, that, if you had an ambition to win your national championship, this might be about as good a year as any to wander off to the curling cabinet, get out the old Bally shoes, scrub down the Thistle brush and wander down to the rink for a wee practice before the championship onslaught. 

I would have thought so anyway.  You would not have seen me for dust.  In fact, so enthused was I about the whole thing that I got as far as the cupboard before I realised that there was just one small thing I had forgotten about and that was that.

So – how come only seven entrants?  Search me.  And who is going to win.  I think the answer is – well, it depends.

Regular readers will remember that I wrote a couple of months ago about the fifth player for the Olympics.  Since I wrote the blog by the way, it has been announced that Scott Andrews, Tom Brewster, Greg Drummond, Michael Goodfellow and David Murdoch, who will skip the rink, have been chosen to represent GB at the Olympics in the men’s competition.  This is a good thing, in my view and all of British curling wish them well.

But, the fifth lady has not yet been announced.  There was much harrumphing when I suggested that Kelly Wood might be a surprise choice (Kelly currently lives in Canada).  Assuming that she is not chosen, then it seems only logical that the fifth player will come from – one of the seven teams competing in the Scottish.  This will make life very difficult for the rest of the team for the simple reason that they have been robbed of a quarter of their team, and most likely a top-end player, to boot.  Presumably, the player concerned will not be able to compete in the Scottish for the same reason that Eve Muirhead, Anna Sloan, Vicky Adams and Claire Hamilton are not able to compete.  And that will be that, then.

So, I repeat – it depends!

The most obvious contender and heir apparent is Hannah Fleming’s strong team.  They were runners-up last year and in fact had the beating of Eve’s team in the round-robin.  They did not perform as well as they might have in the final, but they are still a strong looking outfit.  Former team mate, Alice Spence replaces Abi Brown who is concentrating on her fourth year studies at university.  Alice and Jennifer Dodds are a strong front end.  Lauren Gray remains at third.

Team Fleming is a funded team so, logically, there is a fair chance that the fifth player will come from their number.  Both Alice and Lauren have been fifth player to Eve and co in the past (and Lauren is going to the European Championships in that capacity this time round), but all four are fine curlers, so any one of them could be picked.

Lorna Vevers, Sarah Reid, Rebecca Kesley and Rachel Hannen look strong as well.  I should report to an enthralled readership that Rebecca recently won the Currie and Balerno points competition, so her confidence is at an all-time high!  Lorna has been there and done it for longer than she will care to remember, Sarah is a gold medal winning World junior champion skip in her own right and Rebecca and Rachel again are a strong front end.

Gail Munro will be back, though there is an element of uncertainty about exactly who she will be with at the championships, given that her three team mates are listed as TBA, TBA and TBA!  It must be the water in Stranraer, or something.  Suffice it to say that if Gail gets her mojo going, the others had better play well to get past her.

There are three younger teams taking part, skipped by Gina Aitken, Jennifer Marshall and Jennifer Martin.  I think that they will compete and will have the beating of some of the other teams.  Will they win the championship?  One of these days, many of them will, but maybe not this season.

So I am leaving Kerry Barr until last.  She is flying quietly under the radar and she and her three team mates, Rachael Simms, Rhiann Macleod and Barbara McPake are all bloody good curlers and chums as well.  They are playing entirely for the fun of it and I think that their innate talent mixed with a wee hint of devil-may-care and topped by some luck along the way – well, you never know!

The competition dates are Friday 29th November to Sunday 1st December 2013 at Dumfries Ice Bowl and then from Monday 10th to Sunday 16th February 2014 at Dewars Centre, Perth.  The format for this year will be a double round-robin followed by a mini page play-off with the top 3 teams from the round-robin progressing.

Ah.  Maybe that’s why there are not so many entries.  Most of the competitors have jobs and other pesky things like that.  You know the kind of thing: you get up in the morning at some ungodly hour; you get on a bus; you commute into your place of work and you earn enough spondulacks to put the tatties on the table.  That pesky thing.

 

Could we not have devised a system to pick a winner of our national championship from seven entrants that was slightly less pedantic and involved?  Just saying!

The One about Falling Numbers of Curlers in Scotland

Computers are great things.  They add up; they subtract and they let you correct typing errors without using Tippex (other correction fluids are available).  I only discovered this, mind you, when a nice lady asked me what all the white scribbles were on my laptop screen.

But they are also a bit bad.  Apparently you can play games on them and this, so I am told, has led to a generation of feckless wasters spending all of their time glued to a screen playing computer games instead of getting out and doing things: things like tanner ba’ kicking against a wall; golf; swimming; rugby; tennis; cycling and, yes, curling.

Although we talk a great game and arguably, to the outside world, our sport has never been healthier with medals galore and all of the reflected glory they bring to armchair fans, the stark reality is that the numbers of participants has fallen dramatically these past twenty years or so.  I used to boast in the pub that Scotland was the second biggest curling nation after Canada (where there is, of course, absolutely hee-haw else to do in winter) with upwards of twenty-five thousand participants (I had made the number up, but I was not that far away from the truth of the matter).  Well, it ain’t twenty-five thousand participants now and nor are we the second biggest curling nation any more.  The USA, where for years curling was somewhat in the doldrums, has perked up.  Curling is a growth sport over the pond and they have leapt ahead of us in terms of the membership of their national body versus ours.

At this point, you will expect me to have a dig at the Royal Club.  I don’t think that would be fair.  The RCCC has been proactive in their activities to develop the sport.  Think of all the initiatives that the Royal Club has come up with in the past decade or so. 
 

·         For the younger generation, there is the Curling’s Cool programme, the annual summer camps and the revamped skills awards.  The club has also taken an active role in coordinating the universities curling programme and, for the past forty-odd years has run the Scottish schools championship as well, of course, as the Scottish Junior Championships.

·         For adults, there is the annual adult “camp” (some camp – it was at the North-West Castle hotel in Stranraer!) and the Virtual Clubs.

·         The club actively promotes disabled curling – not just for wheelchair users, but also now for visually-impaired and deaf curlers. 

For further information on all of these initiatives, go to http://royalcaledoniancurlingclub.org/development/ and have a look at what is on offer.  I would argue that, were it not for these initiatives, the sport might well be in a far worse position than it is now. 

The Mother Club’s job has not been helped by the closure of a number of curling centres – places like Lochgoilhead, Forest Hills, Pitlochry, Letham Grange, Brora and Gogar Park.  I admit that many of these venues were kind of built in the wrong place and did not have a population hinterland large enough to sustain them.  That is not true though of the likes of Gogar in Edinburgh and Forest Hills just to the north of the Glasgow conurbation.  With the demise of each rink, the sport quietly lost many a curler.

At the current leakage rate, we will be plum out of curlers in about twenty-five years or so.  OK – so there is an element of hyperbole in the figures and someone once said something about “lies, damned lies and statistics”, but you get the picture.  The trouble is that all of this is happening over the long term.  It’s a bit like global warming; small changes every year that you don’t really notice until you take stock and compare things to fifty years ago (or in Scottish curling’s case, twenty years ago).  Perhaps most worryingly of all, to the likes of me at least, is the fact that at the recent AGM, there was much talk about ten curlers not being allowed to play in the Scottish Championship this coming year – important issue though that is, especially to the ten curlers involved - but not a lot of talk about the falling numbers playing our great sport!

At this point, let me introduce you to Logan Gray.  No – not that one; not the competitive curler Logan Gray with the loud trousers on the telly.  The one I want to introduce you to is a bit more thoughtful and contemplative.  He is the one who cares deeply about the future of his sport and is currently employed as the Ice Sports Development Officer in Stirling.  He is perhaps less well-known, but I would argue that he is the more important of the two – certainly when it comes to the good of the sport and its future. 

Logan was telling me about a couple of initiatives that he has introduced up in Stirling in which he is trying to enlist the support of the various clubs to back up his development programme.  Let him take up the story:

What I’m doing is asking the clubs to get their members to go out and find people to come to TryCurling sessions.  Once the members have found these new recruits they should accompany them to the session as a familiar face for support and also to socialise with them. It should make the new and very alien environment a little less daunting for the new curler!  The attraction to curling for the masses is the sociability of the sport and if you don’t know anyone it isn’t going to be very sociable at first…

The role the club has here is twofold.  I’m offering them a day and time suited to their club to maximise their opportunity to recruit but also to retain new curlers in the long run. So they need to pick a date and time that suits their club and members.   Secondly they need to motivate their members to get out there and find people.  We need to be more proactive and by having one session (per season) on a date tailored to a club, the whole membership can focus on it and all push to get people signed up.  It’s a more focused approach and once the date has passed the obligation is gone until next season. 

I think all clubs serious about their future should consider having a recruitment officer, as you mentioned, to carry out this role as when I speak to clubs and ask what they need help with. Every single club says “we need more members”.  This is very different to clubs being represented at TryCurling sessions – they need to go out and find people to attend the sessions. 

We need to play to our sport’s strengths and for me… that is acknowledging that people who curl are not randoms who come in off the street (Olympic fever aside).  People do not wake up in the morning and have an overwhelming urge to try curling.  A huge majority of people who currently curl have been brought into the sport by people they know who have targeted their friends, family, neighbours, colleagues, so curlers need to take responsibility for the future of our sport.  Curling clubs are lucky that they have a fantastic resource available to them in most ice rinks where the facility / development group/development officer / curling school arranges coaching opportunities for new curlers, unlike clubs in other sports who have to provide this for themselves to enable them to grow.  I’ve spent a lot of time with clubs over the last 6 months meeting them to explain that this resource exists for their use and encouraging them to use it more.  Don’t bring people in off the street and toss them straight into a league.  Clubs will have a better chance of retaining these new curlers if they have had a proper introduction to the sport from qualified coaches and learning alongside other novices.

Essentially what should happen is this.  The clubs actively recruit new people, book them onto our TryCurling sessions, the new curler advances through the new curler pathway by going to beginner classes then virtual club and within a year, Bob’s your uncle – the club is rewarded for their efforts and has a new member, with no financial cost to the club, just a little effort annually from their members to try and find one person to enrol for a TryCurling class.

Logan’s work is bearing fruit and this year more than three times the number of curlers have come through the TryCurling programme than last.

So, in conclusion, I think we need to have a care.  Our sport – in common with others, let it be said – is going through something of a crisis at grassroots level.  We have a particularly interesting year coming up with the Olympics and we have a chance to use them as a springboard to introduce new curlers to the sport.  Link that with the kind of initiative that Logan is introducing in the Stirling area and we have a chance to grow our sport again.  Our clubs, maybe with a recruitment officer in place, need to get together with their local development officers so that there is a connect between their development activities and active recruitment of new curlers.  Finally, and let this be shouted from the rooftops, every rink should have “come and try” days from February onwards, to build on the interest that two Olympic Gold medals will engender!

No pressure on the Olympians, then!

Four Down - Six to Come!

A couple of weeks ago, and there really was no surprise when the announcement was made; Eve Muirhead, Anna Sloan, Vicky Adams and Claire Hamilton were introduced to the world as the first four UK Olympians for the Winter Olympics 2014 in Sochi.  The more interesting thing about the announcement, to me at least, was not so much the names of the four who were announced, more the names of the six remaining.

On the men’s side, Scott Andrews, Tom Brewster, Greg Drummond, Michael Goodfellow and David Murdoch have been playing as a five-man team this past season.  Skipping duties have been shared by Tom and David, though latterly – and certainly throughout the Scottish and World Championships, David seemed permanently to have taken over that role with Tom, for the most part at least, playing third.  Those five would seem to be the obvious choices for the Olympic spots. 

I hope that the announcement has only been delayed to get “two bites at the publicity cherry” rather than one; this would be a good thing for our sport.  If that is the case, then I further hope that the five people involved have been tipped the wink to prevent unnecessary worries on their part.  The delay in the announcement has got me worrying however that perhaps one of the places is still under discussion; this would be bad news for the player involved, but equally bad news for the team from which the fifth player would be plucked.  It would have to search high and wide for a replacement to take part in the Scottish championships this year and would undoubtedly lessen their chances of ultimate success.

Which leads me neatly back to the ladies fifth player.  Doubtless watchers and commentators will be looking with interest at who goes to the European championships with team Scotland (this pre-Olympics competition sees the Olympic team pre-selected).  Alice Spence and Lauren Gray have both recently been involved as fifth players when Eve and her team have gone out to the World or European championships.  Kelly Wood, now Canada-based has also been involved in that capacity.  If either Lauren or Alice are chosen as the fifth player, this will have as much of a detrimental effect on their team’s chances in the Scottish championships as in the men’s competition.

Which (there we go again with a pronoun at the start of a paragraph!) makes me think that the fifth player will be none other than Kelly Wood.  Now I know that the very thought will send lions into pigeon lofts; that there will be gnashing of teeth and that observers will fulminate. 

“What is the point of spending taxpayers’ money developing talent here in the UK if we just drive a coach and horses through everything and bring in someone from outside the system as the fifth player?” they will ask.  Good question, but if you are a high heid yin charged with winning medals and if that is how you know you will be judged, then as far as you are concerned, and with due respect to all, the question is massively irrelevant.  They have done it before (though not, it has to be said, with conspicuous success!) and, if that’s what it takes, they will do it again.

If it were I, then I would ask Eve, Anna, Vicky, Claire and David (Hay) who they thought would fit the specialised bill of fifth player and who they would be comfortable with as part of the team and I would be guided by that.  Politics should not enter it; feelings are not the issue here.  At this stage of the game, it’s about giving GB the best possible chance to go out there and win a medal.  Period.

Oh - and another thing.  If I am right, I hope that the wink has already been tipped there as well.  Get with the sit-ups, woman and get with the programme!

Robin

The European Mixed in Edinburgh

Edinburgh. Scotland’s capital city and home to quite a big castle; its main street is only built up on one side, so that people can look up at said castle; its New Town is older than the USA; its zoo has two pandas, one of whom (the female) may be pregnant (right enough – the male probably wouldn’t be); and home of the Spanish-upturned-fishing-boat and very, very expensive Scottish parliament.

Yet never – not once – has she ever hosted a European, never mind World curling championship. Well – that’s not strictly true. When the old Scotch Cup used to come-a-calling back in the late fifties and early sixties, rounds were played in different rinks, so the old Haymarket rink of blessed memory hosted the odd round of play.

This is all about to change though because later this month, from September 14-21 to be precise, Murrayfield curling rink is putting on a show. After visiting Andorra, Italy, Spain, Austria, the Czech Republic, Greenacres, Denmark and Turkey, the European Mixed Curling Championship is coming back to Scotland this year and Edinburgh is the host city. Andy Morrison, chair of the organising committee, and the rest of his team have been working hard to get the event off the ground with very little notice.

The EMCC started as recently as 2005. The first event was held in Andorra. I played in the rink the weekend prior to the inaugural event in a Reform CC overseas outing and it is fair to say that the ice was 'interesting'. The combined talents of Mark Callan and Scott Henderson, neither of them mugs at the old ice technician game, managed eventually to get things vaguely playable with about ten feet of swing. I should perhaps add that this was on the reverse hand – it took me back to my youth at Crossmyloof! After that somewhat inauspicious start, the competition has rumbled along merrily. Scotland has a great record with first-place finishes from four of eight starts.

There are twenty-five competing countries, all of whom have been placed into one of three groups, A, B and C. Scotland, skipped by reigning EMCC champion and all-round 'good egg' Ewan MacDonald, find themselves in Group A. Ewan’s regular third in the Mixed is Eve Muirhead who, if she sticks in, could become quite good at the game. She, to be very fair, has other more Olympian commitments this season, so is not competing and her place is being taken by none other than Kay Adams. Euan Byers and Karen Barthelemy make up a strong front end.

Mind you, what a draw they have in round one - none other than former champions, Germany, skipped by Andy Kapp. Andy has 'form' at Murrayfield; he is a past winner of the famous Edinburgh International Curling Championships. Their game is on Saturday 14th at 19.30.

There will be bleachers in the rink and seating for about 200 souls. There is plenty of car parking right beside the rink and there are three sessions per day (10.00, 14.30 and 19.00) from the Sunday (15th) through Thursday (19th). You can find a full draw on the website here.

There is nothing more fun than attending an international curling event, so I have some advice: get yourself down to Murrayfield and take in at least a couple of the rounds; better still go for the whole week. It is not that often that Scotland competes in a sport on home ground where there is the definite sniff of a medal on offer.

See you there!

Next season's big events

Tuesday. And a grand day it was; sunny and bright and the temperature crashed through the mid-teen barrier here in Balerno – just for a while, to be fair. Positively sweltering we were and I got the two lawns cut and the front one scarified as well. Life is good, but that was summer and it is now time to think about curling again as we move inexorably towards autumn and finally winter. Why do we bother talking about the seasons, mind you? We just have the weather here and there’s an end to it.

An old friend of mine, Alasdair Seftor – actually, he’s not old but he has been the Edinburgh Curling Club treasurer these past few years and he’s not aged well – recently got in touch to ask me if I would be so good as to blog about the European Mixed Curling Championships, due to take place at Murrayfield from Saturday 14th until Saturday 21st September. As an aside, since this event was introduced in 2005, Scotland has won four gold medals – precisely three more than any other nation! When you reflect on the quality of the gold medal winning skips, mind you, it is hardly surprising – Tom Brewster (twice), Ewan Macdonald and David Edwards! Eve Muirhead wasn’t a bad third for Ewan either, come to think about it (with no disrespect to the other thirds!).

This year’s Scottish champions, newly-crowned on Sunday 31st March, are Ewan Macdonald, Eve Muirhead, Euan Byers and Karen Barthelemy. This, in other words, is a major European competition and Scotland is sending a team of non-mugs (there you go, Ewan; you are now officially a non-mug!) to see if another gold medal can be added to the tally. Check out this website for further details.

Let’s take this a little bit further though because Dumfries pitched for and won the right to host three competitions next season, the World Mixed Doubles and the Ladies’ and Men’s World Senior Championships. These are great events and Dumfries will be the place to be from 22nd to 29th April 2014. The websites for the events are still under development, but put the dates in your diary.

Oh – and longer term? Well, I understand that Scotland may well be in the running for another World Championship in two or three years’ time. Watch this space!

Robin

The Commitment Required

As many readers will testify, I have been banging on far too long about the level of commitment that the current system demands of our elite young curlers and the detrimental effect that this can have on their studies or the early part of their career. It is important that those older and wiser give appropriate guidance and advice to athletes who, if we are not careful, will have their heads turned with the promise of medals, fame and fortune when at least one -and probably two in our football-obsessed sporting culture - of these flighty mistresses will remain unattainable.

It is all very well for full-time coaches who are paid to get that commitment; it is all very well for the self-employed; it is all very well for full-time curlers; it is all very well for the children of Croesus. But what about the rest of us?

And how do we square another circle? Evidence demonstrates time and again that curlers hit their peaks at different times. Glenn Howard and Kevin Martin, to name but two Canadian stars, are well into their forties, yet are still curling at the very top level. They would be nowhere in Scotland’s current system, because they all have jobs and careers to pursue as well as their curling dreams.

At this point, I shall make a startling admission. I play golf – not, to be fair, as anyone else might recognise it, but I do wander around the long grass in search of lost causes most Saturday mornings when the rest of you are still tucked up in the warm quagmire that passes for your pit. The course that has been most damaged in the course of this typically weekly pursuit (not the right word; it suggests speed!) is Baberton on the south-west side of Edinburgh. It is a fine course and has produced Ewan Murray as an example as well as a couple of other golfers good enough to pursue their golfing dreams on the American golfing circuit.

This got me and an old curling friend a-talking after my last post. Would it not be possible to negotiate some kind of deal with the University of Stirling? Could they not be persuaded to run a curling programme that on the one hand gave participants the chance to secure a good degree and on the other gave them the appropriate time as required to train and compete?

Perhaps we need our sporting authorities to get together and thrash some kind of deal out with the university? I suspect that a benefactor might be required to help sponsor the programme – I don’t know, really I don’t how these things work, but this would surely help those at the start of their careers at least.

The next challenge will be to keep the talented late twenties- and early thirties-brigade on side. Right now, we have Tom Brewster, the manager at Aberdeen curling club and David Murdoch, a full-time curler in that age bracket. But how do we keep the likes of Logan Gray and David Edwards enthused and committed enough to keep challenging? Therein lies your problem.

Talking of benefactors, curling needs these now more than ever. I am going to give a plug here. My old mucker and team mate Tom Pendreigh started his business, British Curling Supplies a few years ago and he does a power of unsung work supporting junior teams and curling generally; he is also a great 'fixer' who was, for example closely involved with the putting together of Goldline’s sponsorship of the Scottish curling tour. He is also heavily involved in the running and management of the Inverness rink. Look him up on the web; we need more of his type supporting our great game. By the way, he can’t help how he looks; his coupon is a gift from on high, though that didn’t stop his mother from pulling the pram!

And on that happy note, I bid you a good summer!

Robin Copland

You cannot argue with the facts

There has been much weeping and gnashing of teeth by pundits (myself included) on Scottish competitive curling these past few seasons. I even read somewhere that a Scottish person was actually supporting the other team in a World Championship game because he was so vehemently opposed to 'the system'. Didn’t really know what to make of that, to be honest; it struck me as odd.

But, and it is something of a big 'but', (I might rephrase that last bit in the edit in case I am accused of being a fatist. Que – moi?), you cannot argue with the facts. This season, in the six major annual competitions, the World Championships, the World Junior Championships and the European Championships (with due respect to the European Mixed, the World Mixed Doubles and the World Senior Championships), Scotland has finished on the podium in all but one. Our tally is two Gold Medals, two Silver Medals and one Bronze. It is a pretty astonishing record when all said and done and credit needs to be given to all of the competitors, too numerous to mention now.

I have as much of a problem as anyone with the level of commitment that is demanded of our young competitors. I fear for their collective futures when the good times, as they surely will, come to an end and they are left with medals, memories but – no job, or perhaps less of a job than their talent deserves. But hey; it’s a free world and choices have to be made. Make your choice and get on with it.

I have just finished reading Jim Telfer’s autobiography. In it, he talks about commitment and the difficulties that Scottish rugby faced in the transition from a wholly amateur game to professionalism. He was firmly of the view that there needed to be an elite level and that the elite clubs (he lobbied for four Scottish elite clubs, loosely based on the old 'districts') would only prosper in a seriously competitive league. He also argued for a vibrant 'amateur' club scene that would develop and nurture new talent. The established clubs, of course, were adamantly opposed to that set-up and instead wanted to become 'elite' themselves. It is fair to say that the sport is only now recovering from the internecine war that developed.

Curling needs to be careful about how it handles the rise of the elite. There is still a stairway that individuals can climb from mere mortal status to international curler. That the system has flaws is not in question. It is wrong and misguided, for example to be proscriptive and judgemental about young teenagers. Kids develop at different speeds. The fourteen year old star may not be so brilliant at twenty. The gauche young teenager may develop into something like the finished article later on in his teens. Let the kids enjoy themselves; let them learn to play in teams of their own choosing; don’t over-coach them – rather make sure that they have the basics right.

When it comes to the business end of the Scottish Championship I remain steadfast in my view that four talented curlers should be able to get together, enter their national championship and win the right to represent Scotland at world level. Trouble for them is that they will have to get past the likes of teams Brewster or Muirhead; there’s the challenge.

Now, let’s talk about five men teams. Actually, let’s not!

Well done though to all of our medal winners. An amazing achievement that would be good to repeat next season when the Olympics make their quadrennial appearance.

Robin Copland

There is something about the Scottish...

Copey writes:

I don’t know whether it is just me, but there is something very special about the Scottish Championships. I only made it to seven final stages of our national championships. Maybe nowadays those curlers who make it year after year become blasé about it; maybe the chances that the top curlers get to curl overseas – far more than we ever got in our pre-funding, pre-Ryanair day – mean that the Scottish has less of a frisson than it used to do. I remember the very first time I ever competed – it was Perth in 1978. You walked in to the old rink and immediately you knew that you were at an event that was beyond the run-of-the-mill. There was something in the air.

I still get that feeling of excitement to this day – especially on finals day. The stakes are high; the competition is fierce; nerves need to be of steel and, let this be said, the quality of play on offer rarely disappoints. 

Of course, they get it easy nowadays. The quality of ice that they play on is the stuff of dreams to those of our generation used to tracks and fall-backs. A nipper in those far-off days was the noisy child in the stands. Our defensive hands were shown on tricky ice and the game was a draw-free zone until a team was down. The free guard was still strutting his stuff outside Buckingham Palace and misses there were a-plenty.

Work kept me away during the week. I was in Amersham, of all places – at the northern extremities of the Metropolitan line. Here’s a thing; when you get to the outskirts of our capital city, the 'tube' is no more a tube than the Glasgow-Edinburgh express. There’s a fact for you to share with your mates over a thoughtful cigar and no mistake. Amersham it was and with a dodgy internet connection to boot. I followed things from afar and occasionally with a buffering delay of an hour or two built in. I followed progress and wished that I was somewhere else – and maybe some time else as well! We live for our youth.

And so to Sunday; at last, we were making the trip north for an old-fashioned day out. The ladies' final was first up and, with due respect to other feisty competitors, the cream of Scottish ladies' curling had risen to the top with the eye-watering prospect of Eve Muirhead versus Hannah Fleming. Who would have thought ten years ago that a curling writer could have written the following of a Scottish ladies final? In international competition, the eight competitors have amassed between them 24 Gold medals and 7 Silver medals. That is an astonishing statement to be able to make and speaks volumes of the quality on offer in Scottish ladies' curling.

We, the watchers, settled back on the bleachers – all but full for the final - and were prepared to be entertained. The Fleming team came out of the blocks at a gallop and their 2 in end five gave them a 4-2 half-time lead. What happened thereafter will be mulled over by the experts for a while to come. Maybe they relaxed a tad; maybe they lost a bit of focus; maybe my old mate and new Scottish senior champion, David Hay, paid a little visit to the Brocks fireworks factory in the break, but whatever it was, the Muirhead team, from hanging on in the first five ends dominated the business end of the game. A big 3 in the sixth end set the tone. They were four shots to the good coming home. Debbie Knox, Hannah’s faithful coach for many a long season, was called onto the ice deep into the tenth end (maybe her input would have been more valuable earlier on in the second half), but by then it was too late and a clearly delighted Muirhead team celebrated a famous win against a team that will be a real threat in years to come.

And so to the men. Logan Gray had tweeted for supporters to come out dressed in 'loudmouth' gear. This is great for the game – colour and excitement. Interestingly, there was a general feeling in the ice hall of support for the underdog. Keith MacLennan and Sandy Gilmour both pitched up in suits that took the breath away. Outrageous trousers were in evidence and Team Gray had electric green shirts and dapper green, black and white check trousers. Sensibly, space up the stairs was limited, so the bleachers were again all but full. It took you back to the old days when crowds were numbered in their thousands. There was a real atmosphere down in the ice hall that added to the occasion.

The men came out. Now, everyone has a view on funding; on five man teams; on the Olympic effect; on curling’s own West Lothian question; on the effects of coaching and all of the rest of it. But, I don’t care. Really, I don’t. When it comes to those nervous slides in a darkened ice hall with the TV cameras waiting and a big expectant crowd sitting hard by the rink - that’s the test. That’s what separates the kids from the grown-ups; it’s curler v curler and that’s what makes the Scottish so special in the curling calendar. You can feel the tension – the nerves. There’s a kind of electricity in the air. Static. A buzz.

Add the side stories. Logan and Michael were Stirling Young Curlers together a decade ago; Ross Paterson and Richard Woods played front end for David Murdoch last season; Tom and David were rivals on ice for years before this season; the same two were team mates in a World Junior Championship almost twenty years ago and played together as kids in Lockerbie. Scott Andrews was up the stairs where he had been on the ice in the previous two finals. Scott, Tom, Greg and Michael were attempting to join curling immortals, Hay (Chuck), Bryden, Glen, Howie and McMillan (Hammy) as three-in-a-row winners of their national championships. On the other hand, Logan, Ross, Al and Boobsy were going for their first win in their national championships. Underdog versus incumbent. I could go on.

And then it was all over! I am going to be honest. I thought that Logan’s last draw against two in the second end was good from his hand. So did the sweepers, who did not really hit it hard until about two thirds or so of the way down the rink. As it crossed the hogline, it seemed to suddenly lose weight. By now the sweepers were pounding into it as if their lives depended on it. Then it stopped – agonisingly short and it was a steal of 2 for the Brewster team. And that was that.

In truth, it was always going to be difficult to fight back from three shots down, but when you are not quite getting the ice (as Logan admitted he wasn’t) and when they are playing just that little bit better than you are, it becomes a long, lonely struggle against the odds. Eventually, Logan and his team offered their hands after eight ends and Team Brewster became Team Scotland. Scott was down on the ice as fast as a butcher’s dog and the five of them celebrated a great win. Logan and his team will be back to fight another day. Words are cheap, I know, in their situation, but they are all talented curlers and hopefully this taste of the big time will whet their appetite for more.

What of the World Championships?  More of that later but suffice to say for the moment that we have two world-class teams going out and with a following wind…