SIGHTHILL launched their defence of the Edinburgh Top Ten bowls title with a commanding 6-2 points victory over Mayfield and their chief inspiration came from club champ Gary Purdie.
Purdie was on home soil but looked to be in deep trouble when blitzed 9-0 over the opening ends by Mayfield spearhead Bob Manson. He got off the mark with a 1 and 4, however, and picked up the pace to level the score at 12-12.
Two ends later Purdi
e led 16-12 then made confident progress to clinch a 21-15 victory in 22 ends.
Sighthill's domination of the home leg of their tie was now a foregone conclusion with the rink of Graeme Eddington, Scott Noble, David Campbell and Jason Ronaldson screaming into a 22-3 lead over Paul Manson (skip) and going on to win 23-14.
Mayfield's home leg saw them bag a good win in the Pairs with Ralston Mackenzie and Mark Welsh losing a 7 to trail 10-3 but recovered strongly to beat Gary Connelly and Jamie Gracie 17-13.
The home trio of Derek Burns, David Ross and Gavin Thomson were beaten 21-8 by Sighthill triple Chris Southwell, John McDermott and Paul Noble. Juniper Green and Craigentinny have strong title-winning form in the Top Ten so their clash promised to be a real cracker.
David Ross delivered the perfect start for Juniper with a runaway 21-8 win over Craig McCall in the Singles.
Support in the Fours came in the shape of comfortable 22-10 win for the rink of Walter Borthwick, Colin Jenkin, Stuart Wilson and Russell Wilson over Andrew Caldwell, Derek McFarlane, Gary Nisbet and Andrew Jeffrey. But Craigentinny produced a lifeline win in their home leg with Grant McLaren and Kevin McFarlane powering to a 20-4 success.
The battle in the Triples was a tightly fought one and Juniper Green clinched a 6-2 victory with David Wilkinson, Grant McAadam and Chris Wilson edging a surprise 9-8 win over Scott Duncan, Kevin Hunter and Willie McDonald.
Elsewhere, three closely-fought matches were decided on shot margin with West End edging out Hillside, Coltbridge getting the better of Longstone and Balerno surviving at the expense of Queensberry. Carrick Knowe emerged 6-2 victors against Slateford while Willowbrae beat Goldenacre and LRFs won against Dean.
The full article contains 398 words and appears in Edinburgh Evening News newspaper.
