Scottish Vets Win on Day One

Scotland made the very best possible start to their defence of the Miller-Stirling Salver when their Vets team produced a magnificent turnaround on Day One. They converted a negative situation from the morning foursomes to a great thumping win after the singles in the afternoon. In the morning, in relatively good conditions (unlike at home) despite a troublesome wind, and playing against the strong Midlands side, they went down 2/1 in the foursomes. Alex Glennie and May Hughes from the West Division, brought in the winning point against Anne Booth and Carol Gibbs - at least one former Curtis Cup player there (webmaster not having details at hand and memory getting worse as the years go by!) But lunch must have set the team up good style for a real tussle. They won all but one of the singles to win outright by 6 games to 3.

East Division's own Karen Ballantyne, not having played in the foursomes, led the team out in the afternoon against the highly experienced Janet Melville, whose pedigree needs no embellishment. After a terrific battle, Karen saw off the opposition on the last hole. Word has it her legs just about gave way with the strain but maybe she was just fixing her shoelaces. What a success! East is proud of you, Karen.

Scotland plays North tomorrow. Same again please.

Results ( Scotland first)
Foursomes
Lorna Bennett and Elaine Allison (Midlands) lost to Jo Ashmore and Janet Melville 4 and 2
Alex Glennie and May Hughes (West) beat Anne Booth and Carol Gibbs 3 and 1
Heather Anderson (Midland) and Mary Smith (Highland) lost to Pat West and Julie Walter 4 and 3

Singles
Karen Ballantyne (East) beat Janet Melville 1 up
Lorna Bennett beat Andrea Stockdale 3 and 1
Kathleen Sutherland (North) beat Cindy Ireland 2 up
Mary Smith lost to Jo Ashmore 7 and 5
Elaine Allison beat Carol Gibbs 4 and 2
Heather Anderson beat Pat West 2 and 1

In the other match, the South - always the "one to beat" (even when the other two are stronger) won by 5 1/2 to 3 1/2 over tomorrow's opponents, the North. There are no details yet of the individual game results. Two big names however, if one may say so, were playing - Chris Quinn and Carol Caldwell, old friends of Scotland over many years.

Right girls. You know what you have to do tomorrow. More of the same.