The Forfar Open, the Horse Race, Independence and Gok Wan.

We played in our first competition of the season in Forfar at the weekend. It was a good one which involved some extracurricular activities to keep us entertained.

The new team shirts got their first outing. In hindsight, when ordering jackets from a company that specialises in clothing rugby teams, it is maybe not a great idea to err on the larger side.

Here is a picture of Scott trying on his new jacket.

As for the curling, I don’t really like going into much detail, so I wont.

Win 9-4 v David Jones. Took our 2’s quite well. Ran it out reasonably easily.
Win 11-3 v Andrew Maitland. They were pretty young.
Win 5-3 v Ally Fraser. Took a 3 in the last to win.
Win 7-1 v Ian Young. This game hurt a little, too early and too hungover.
Win 6-5 v Graeme Shedden. Very close, stole a 3 in the 7th to come back.

So we topped our group and went on to play Robin Brydone in the quarter final. We did the classic Team Edwards routine, go through the group stages undefeated to then lose the first knockout game. We gave up a steal of 2 early on, then an unlucky 3 to be 5-1 down at the halfway point. We managed to claw it back a bit and made him draw the 8ft against 3 for a 7-5 win. Pretty frustrating, but they played quite well.

On the Friday evening following our 3 game day, we had a couple beers, which then turned into being a lot of beers. While this was going on, the entertainment in the ice rink involved a horse race. This involved the two competitors to sit on a chair with a piece of string attached to a wooden horse. The goal is to roll the string around the wee stick to get the horse to your chair first. With one nominated player from each team to compete, Scott was the Team Edwards representative. The picture below shows the concept of the game.

The concept

He battled through 3 rounds of intense competition with the notable demolition of Kerry Barr on the way. It was an extremely proud moment for him. Unfortunately, in the best of 3 grand-final, Scott lost out 2-1, and the EQ pad went to Angus.

Nervous Kerry.... as she should have been!

Following the horse race, Team Edwards made a stop in a local bar. We came across a local gentleman who could be described as having a few too many beverages. After a couple of minutes of us arriving, he wished to engage us in an intense political debate. We glanced on several subjects throughout the course of the evening from Scottish Independence all the way through to conspiracy theories regarding Princess Diana. The very articulate gentleman believed that that the SAS in-fact took her out because she was pregnant with Dodi Fayed’s child. The reason behind this was the government did not want this child to be King. We will let you figure out why this theory one does not really work.

But just in case Rhiann is reading, it doesn’t work because neither Diana or Dodi were members of the Royal family at that time. Therefore, the child would not be inline to the throne. And for Rhiann again, Dodi Fayed was Mohamed Al-Fayed son. Mohamed Al-Fayed was the guy who used to own Harrods. And Harrods is a shop.

As for the cards over the weekend. Something very unique happened. Nobody could really believe it. JOHN PENNY WON A GAME! Congratulations on the victory.

As Dave is now getting into his old age, he requires spectacles for some very basic tasks such as playing cards, curling and looking like a camp Chinese television presenter.

Gok Wan

Dave Edwards

That was The Forfar Open. Next up is the Edinburgh International during the second weekend in November. Scott is going AWOL for that weekend, as he has to work. As far as I am aware, we do not have a replacement for the weekend at this point. If you would like the opportunity of a lifetime to play second for Team Edwards, you can apply in writing to David Edwards. Or text/facebook him. 

That is all from Team Edwards

Goodbye.

The Winter Collection

I'm sure there will be a tear in the eye of many a curling fan when they hear the news that the "Green Machine" is no more.  The 2011/2012 collection has been replaced with a new look for this season , which includes the latest curling fashion accessory, player numbers.  The addition of numbers to the kit this season came as special request from Macleod as he thinks they're "cool".

So it's black and yellow this season guys and the bumble bee look is sure to provide a real buzz!

A sneak preview of Macleod's rear end

The first outing for the kit will be at the Forfar Open next Friday 11th October at 10am against team David Jones where we're be hoping to get our season off to a winning start.

Finally we'd like to apologise to everyone in advance as we fully expect team super fan Alan Clark to have his beach towel across several seats prior to the game and viewing space may well be at a premium.

Summer 2012 - We're back!

It's been a while since we last posted so I'll apologise now for the length of this update!

Well the good news is that unlike The Rangers Football Club PLC our team will emerge from the off-season with it's name, reputation (if we had any), history and personnel intact. The administration at Rangers must have watched a lot of Bullseye during the eighties and taken Jim Bowen's catchphrase "Stay out of the black and into the red" the wrong way. If any of you kids don't remember Bullesye that's what we used to watch on a Saturday night before rubbish like the X-Factor and Strictly Come Dancing came on the scene.

Let's cover off the only serious piece of news that's worthwhile touching on in this post and that's relates to funding. Although the team does remain intact for the season ahead we will not be part of the RCCC World Class Performance programme. We decided at the end of last season that the programme criteria doesn't fall in line with our needs for various reasons and have therefore decided to move forward without any official support. We are however pleased to announce that coach Greig Henderson is still on the roster and will be helping the team out with his expert game analysis and wine selection skills.

Well that's all the dull stuff covered off so what have we been up to over the summer?

At the start of August Dave had a one off loan move to team Curl One Out approved for the Stirling Summer Skins. In what can only be described as an absolute disgrace the team sunk enough alcohol to take down a cruise liner and were incapable of curling on the Friday night. I'm sure some would question whether they were capable of curling at any point during the weekend. One point to highlight was the dance off challenge issued by Kerry Barr on Saturday night. This really was a non event after Disco Dave pulled off the winning Crippled Grandad move on the dance floor to which Barr had no reply. Maybe you'll have better luck at skating Barr face!

A picture of Dave was taken during one of the games with Team Curl One Out

After only a few months of romance Johns other half decided that she'd had enough of him and flew off to Australia for the summer. He's spent last few months pining for her swift return. John joined to family business as a joiner last year and lets just say he's a little accident prone. It therefore has to be positive that we've had no accident reports this summer after he walked into a plank of wood with his head and stood on a nail last year.

John: When will she be back?

I'm sure all the ladies out there will really be wanting to know what the team heart throb Scotty has been up to this summer. Unfortunately the Peugeot passion wagon is no more and has had her last trip. Although we're yet to see the replacement the rumour is that you'll not be disappointed. The question on everyones lips is whether Scott will be the next in line to replace Daniel Craig as James Bond? It was only last week he managed to break into his own house with all the skills of 007 only to find out the front door was open.

It is rumoured that Scott has purchased a new Austin Powers styled machine

Colin set up a new gardening business during the summer and is now trading as Hedge and Lawn Garden Services. In a shameless plug for business if anyone in and around the Edinburgh area needs the lawn mowed, hedge cut or the odd bush trimmed he is your man. Could Colin be the new Alan Titchmarsh?

Beachgrove Gardens Jim McColl is hiding from BBC bosses in the fear that Colin may in line to replace him

The guys (minus Scott who was working on his market stall) met up for a BBQ and beers a few weeks back in Aberdeen and below is some footage from our trip to Go Ape at Crathes.

Stay loose silly goose!

Scottish Championships Final Post

Well that was shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiite.

After going 8-1 in the Round Robin, we lost both the 1v2 game and the semi-final. Disappointing does not quite cover this one.

We didn’t fire at all in the game against Warwick Smith in the 1v2. Saying that, we had many opportunities for 2, and we even converted a few of them. The key end was the 8^th when things were really not setting up well for us. After two freezes by Dave Smith, we were in a fair bit of trouble. Dave gave us a chance with his first, but the second didn’t quite come off and Warwick had an open draw for 4. We were only 2 down at this point and we gave ourselves an opportunity to make the comeback, but Warwick made 2 good draws to the button in the 10^th for a place in the final.

Skip Cottage Curling
David Edwards

The semi-final was a much better game. In the 3^rd end we had to draw to the 4ft against 3, the stone picked at the hogline but we managed to drag it to the top of the 8ft to cut it down to 1. In the next end, things were looking quite good for us with a lot of our stones hanging about. Tom blasted them but left us with a double for 2. Unfortunately we jammed and gave up another steal. Next end we had a split for 3. Hard to describe how unlucky this one was. But trust me, it was fucking unlucky. After that we forced the 1, we then had a hit for 2/1 depending on a measure. Obviously the umpires decided that the stones were exactly the same and that apparently means it was only a 1. We had to go for it a bit in the next couple of ends, we had a small hit and roll with Dave’s last that wrecked and left Tom with and open draw for 3. He made it and we conceded.

                                                                  GAME OVER

Skip Cottage Curling
Colin Campbell/Scott Macleod/John Penny

 Well 3^rd place is not awful, although it was not what we wanted after going 8-1.

Thanks to everyone over the last week and the entire season for their support, it has been much appreciated.

I would also like to congratulate Tom, Greg, Scott and Michael for winning the Scottish again. Well done. Also congratulations to Dave for getting to go as 5^th. Your rock matching skills will have improved significantly this year! Good luck in Basel!

Cheers

Team Edwards


PS I thought I would just let you all know that with these blogs it is possibly to find out what people have searched to reach the blog. The most popular search used to reach the Team Edwards Blog over the last month is "Swingers Club". I find that very entertaining.

Tommy Sheridan

Scottish - Saturday Update

New blog to kill some time before the 1v2! The background TV show today is Jeremy Kyle US Version. (Also John’s choice). One observation from this is, if you have a tattoo on your face, some shit is going down.

Mike Tyson

And with the curling, we really can’t complain about how it has gone so far.

As you can see, we are on 8-1. But I am sure that you will all already know that as I have inundated you with facebook statuses. Apologies, I am a Social Networking junkie. Anyway, this means that we have won the Round Robin and are lined up to play Warwick Smith in the 1v2. Tom Brewster plays Ewan MacDonald in the 3v4.

The game kicks off at 2.30pm with the semi-finals at 7.30pm. Hopefully we will not need the semi-final, but it is nice to have the back up!

I am limited with time and have the memory of a goldfish so I will only give a quick rundown of the last 2 Round Robin games yesterday.

Goldfish

 

John Hamilton 9-6 Win

We were always in reasonable control although we gave up a couple soft 2’s which made it close. They took their 2 in the tenth for an Extra End. Dave made a short run back for a 3, and the victory.

Tom Brewster 6-5 Loss

It was a good game against Tom. It did not change things at all for us, but we had the chance to put him in a world of pain if we were to win. We held an early lead and had the opportunity to go down the last end peels with the hammer. We were unfortunately forced to take our 1 in the 9^th, then had to prevent Brewster from taking a 2 in the last end. We did not manage that, and Brewster got the Win.

Skip Cottage Curling
Greg Drummond/Tom Brewster + John Penny/David Edwards

My form in “Bugger your neighbour” has dropped. I have had a second last and two last place finishes in the last couple of days! And this was with Greig Henderson playing! Unbelievable!

We changed up the game last night. It was now Team Whist. This was the first appearance of the game since the Oslo Cup in September. If I remember correctly, my team, which had many different combinations, were 0-7. This time it was going to be different. The line-up was Team Frontend (Colin and Scott) v Team Rearend (Dave and John).

The result was a big win for the sweepers. Very pleased.

Well we are away to get some calories for the 1v2. Wish us luck with this one. We really want to be in the final.

Cheers

Team Edwards

Scottish - Wednesday Update

We have got a lie in this morning, so I thought I would do a blog update as John is being entertained by kid’s television. I am not joking. It’s not even like it’s the only thing on! We have got sky! I had forgotten how annoying the Chuckle Brothers are. Ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch Chucklevision.

The Chuckle Brothers

On Monday morning, we had our 8 minute practice on each sheet. This gave us a chance to pick out any temperamental stones for the upcoming games. My Advanced Higher Graphic Communication A came into use for the first time since the exam in 2006. I got my compass and set squares out and had a wee project to draw a curling head on a grid. We used this to mark down where thrown stones landed and to compared to splits. It was immensely professional.

My gear

The first game was against Ewan MacDonald. Dave made a good draw to get the hammer. Following that, it was a rocky first couple of ends with John pulling us out of a lot of trouble. His triple was especially sexy. The 8^th end was the key for us. We played a really good one and after a few big smashes from MacDonald, there were still a few lying about the house and had the nose hit for 3. Good win!

© Skip Cottage
Dave Murdoch/Dave Edwards

We had a 7.35am first practice on Tuesday Morning. Raged. The game was again Jay McWilliam. We covered the pin with the LSD to get hammer. The early ends went well and we built up a 3-0 lead. We kept it reasonably clear throughout the rest of the game with McWilliam needing a 2 in the 10^th for an extra.  He didn’t really have a shot and ran out of time. So it was another win on the board for Team Edwards.

© Skip Cottage
Glen Muirhead/Scott Macleod

The Tuesday afternoon game was against David Murdoch. It was a big game for us. If we won, we had the potential to go clear at the top of the table. We once again got the hammer and we needed it as we did not have a phenomenal first end. In the middle of the game we got a great couple of twos courtesy of Dave’s nailers. One up with in the last end, we had a nose hit double for the game, which we made. 3-0 and the top of the table!

There is a really long way to go but we are certainly happy with our start. Today we have Graeme Black at 12 noon and Warwick Smith at 8pm.

So, the curling is going well, but I have not mentioned the most important development of the week. Our card game of choice is “bugger your neighbour” which is a variation of trumps. The rules are here.

http://www.pagat.com/exact/ohhell.html

Anyway, I(Scott) am winning it! Anybody with experience of our games will know how much of a turnaround and a shock this is. In my opinion, it was just a matter of time before my superior skill and talent shone through to get these vital W’s on the board. I intend to keep the run going.

Bob Cowan is blogging from the event, http://skipcottagecurling.blogspot.com/.

I will try and blog again, but don’t count on it!

Wish us luck!

Team Edwards

Mens Qualifiers

 We made it through to Scottish Mens Finals! The group is shown below.

We did not have the most convincing of qualifications. It was pretty ropey at times.

A picture of some rope.

I will now give you all a 2 sentence summary of each game.

Lose - Graeme Black 3-6

Graeme played a lot of shots and we did not. By far our worst game of the qualifiers.

The Bye

We went on a team date to watch Sherlock Holmes. Very romantic.

Win - Alan Manuel 9-3

We also did not play very well. Won it without too many issues.

Lose - Logan Gray 4-6

This was a really good game. Unfortunately for us Logan was being a bit of a dick and kept making ridiculous shots.

Win - Alan Gillies 6-5

We were toiling for a while. Had to make a wee bit of a comeback.

Win - Dave Hay 10-3

We could have quite easily been 5-0 down after the first 2 ends. Mr Edwards was on form, so it was all good.

Lose - Ally Fraser 4-5

Played really well, but it was a defensive game, so it was tight until the end. Had the 4ft for the win, and missed.

Win – Graeme Shedden 9-0

Was not a classic from Shedden. We stole quite a lot of ends.

Win – Bruce Mouat 8-2

Took a 3 in the first. I had some fun peeling following that.

This left us on a 6-3 record. Because all the other results went our way, we got through without any tie breakers! It looked like we could have been there for weeks if we had lost the last one. There was a possibility of a 5 way tiebreaker for one spot.

The draw for the Mens Finals is now out.

http://royalcaledoniancurlingclub.org/competitions/scottish-mens-championship/

This is how it looks for us.

13^th Feb 4.15pm MacDonald

14^th Feb 8.00am McWilliam

14^th Feb 4.00pm Murdoch

15^th Feb 12noon Black

15^th Feb 8.00pm Smith

16^th Feb 12noon Young

16^th Feb  8.00pm Gray

17^th Feb  8.00am Hamilton

17^th Feb  4.00pm Brewster

The 8pm game followed by an 8am game is going to be pretty rough. I am sure we will manage though.

That’s it.

Cheers

Team Edwards