5 A Side in Division 1 Opening Thriller

There were only two games in the Moray Province League this week and what a doozy the top match turned out to be !Last season’s champs, Elgin’s Kenny Oswald and runners up Buckie’s Alan Campbell , skipped by Steve Rankin served up a veritable ding dong.
The Buckie outfit took a single with the hammer in the first, but King Kenny responded with a count of 3 in the second. It seemed as if the Rankin mob had now assumed control of the match as a single followed by another and then a deuce against the head gave them a 5-3 lead. Oswald could only manage a 1 to trail 5-4 going up the last without the hammer.
On keen, fairly straight ice, the Buckie rink lay 3 as the Elgin skip played his last stone,drawing perfectly through a biggish port to lie shot but just behind the tee. Rankin merely had to follow his opponent’s draw, but just pushed his delivery wide and it could never draw back onto the centre line, wrecking on short stones to allow Oswald’s rink to share the spoils.
In the other game, despite counting 3 at the second end,Bill Jaffrey’s Fochabers rink never thereafter troubled the scoreboard as a superior Aberlour outfit led by Andy Cameron eased away to a 10-3 win.
Meanwhile, in Inverness, the West Division 1 game between title holder Ardclach’s Ally Fraser and top Division newcomer Nairn’s Jamie Cattell resulted in a regulation win for the crack Ardclach rink. Fellow top League newcomers Nairn’s Gus Forbes were also handed a harsh lesson by their more experienced club colleagues Ali Asher. Forbes managed just 2 singles as the Nairn baker relentlessly raced to an 11-0 lead after only 3 ends . A further 4 applied the coup de grace to the Forbes boys. Habitual title contenders the Greenwood gang accounted for Dalcross’s Mark Fraser. In a very tight game, Ruaridh Greenwood put a shine on the score with a last end 3 for his 8-4 victory.
In Division 2 Larry Kerr had a straightforward win against Nairn Ladies skipped by Margaret Pottie. Singles for the Ladies at the first and last ends bookended Larry’s 11-2 win.
The game of the night was a terrifically tight tussle between Ian Thomson and the missing Ricky Marwick. The Nairn team obviously missed their skip as they just missed out in an intriguing 6-5 loss.