A night to remember – for all the wrong reasons.

This first game of the 2024/25 season started with high hopes but finished, prematurely, with a disaster.  Poor George Morrison, whose star had shone brightly for four ends, took a nasty fall in the fifth which resulted in him being taken by ambulance to A&E.  A broken hip has been diagnosed and at the time of writing, the prognosis is for surgery to repair the damage followed by a lengthy recovery period.

It all started so well.  Full of new term brightness and enthusiasm the teams assembled at the allotted hour of 6 pm.  Well, almost at the allotted time as Donny Hay came panting through the door just as the first end was getting under way after hitting heavy traffic – on his bicycle.  Actually it was work that had kept him but all was fine since he was well within the permitted allowance for lateness. He joined his Team Waterlow team mates Richard Willson who was playing third and Kay Wilson at lead, the latter subbing for Fiona Auld. (There were Auld sized gaps in both teams due to Fiona and Dougie being away at a distant wedding this week).

Team MacConnachie comprised the aforesaid Geemo at third, and not one, but two substitutes; Rob Garner in at second for the missing Dougie and lead Bob Cameron standing in for an absent Gill Neil.

Your correspondent had already played his first game with VETS the previous morning and found the ice to be as keen as a razor’s edge.  Would it be the same? Of course not – it was just the opposite.  The first end saw a lot of stones falling short and it felt as if there had been a fresh fall of snow on the rink. Team MacConnachie were much better at coping with the conditions, notably Geemo who was already on fire.  With the build-up of stones at the front, skip Waterlow singularly failed to get anything in the house and at the finish of a catastrophic end, Team W found themselves to be five stones in arrears – not an encouraging start.

Team MacConnachie were strong again in the second, Geemo once more shining.  The ingredient of any game, a modicum of luck, was also absent from Team W’s game.  Feeling rather pleased with himself for a successful tap-up with his last stone, Skip W thought he had a single in the bag.  But that was without a classic Macornerkickey special – his last stone failing to meet its allotted target but casually spinning into the centre anyway.

Team Waterlow finally managed to score in the third end with a two to avoid the granny but lost out again in the fourth albeit only by a single stone.

It was in the fifth end that disaster struck.  Having played his second stone, and waiting for Richard to take his turn, George tumbled on the ice, landing heavily on his left side.  He was helped off the ice but clearly something was badly wrong. The excellent ice team swung into action, George was swaddled against the cold as he lay on the floor and an ambulance was called.  As luck would have it, Edinburgh Medicals were playing on the adjacent rink so there was no shortage of experts to keep an eye on him as we waited.

George remained stoic throughout and told us to carry on with the game.  We finished the end although our hearts weren’t really in it – indeed skip W vaguely recalls threading a draw through a gap at the front of the house to take the end by one stone but it didn’t mean very much.  Then there were phone calls to make and other things to think about so rather than carry on, the teams agreed to close at five ends, so finishing with a score of 7-3 to Team MacConnachie.

By now it was well past seven and coincidentally, Deemo had turned up to catch the end of our game and check out form, only to find his brother on the floor.  As we waited for the ambulance we all realised just how cold it is to stand around at the rink, let alone lie prone as George was – Rob kept going to his car to bring an extra blanket and what seemed like an endless supply of coats for additional insulation for George and anyone else who needed it.  And it was a long wait. The ambulance eventually arrived at around 10.30 pm.  Professional and calm as ever, the crew swiftly gave George a thorough checking over (by now he had got very cold) and painkillers before carefully easing him on to a stretcher and into the ambulance, finally setting off for the Royal Infirmary at around 11 pm.

John.

The final fixture of the Holyrood Curling Club season was the usual double header when all four teams were on the ice at the same time. Team A (Deemo) played Team B (MacConnachie) while Team C (Herd) was up against Team D (Waterlow).

With the overall league title already settled in favour of Team Deemo, the evening was all about the runner up positions. Although Team Waterlow could theoretically have been caught in the battle for second place in terms of points, they would have likely held the position on ends/shots. Team MacConnachie were in third place but there was a chance that team Herd could have caught them.

In the end, despite a very enjoyable evening’s curling, the result was, unusually, that both games were peeled. With everyone gaining a single point, the league positions remained unchanged.

There was somewhat of a hiatus at the beginning of proceedings as skip MacConnachie’s diary told him it was a 6.30 pm start, not the 6.00 pm actually scheduled while James appears to have lost his diary altogether as he was a no-show. Despite this the A versus B game then proceeded at fine clip, managing to complete a relatively uncommon eight ends overall.

Meanwhile Teams C and D were at full strength with super-sub Bob making up Team C’s numbers. The more relaxed pace of this game meant just seven ends were played and both teams had a fair few ‘if only’ moments. Team Herd particularly gave Team Waterlow a scare as they had every chance of taking three or four shots at the last end although Team Waterlow just managed to cut them down to a single to draw the match.

So congratulations to Team A on winning the magnificent Meikle trophy (already at the engravers as this report is being written) and commiserations to Team C for taking the wooden spoon.

The evening was completed with a drink and an exchange of tales of curling heroics and derring do. Only one more event is now due – the Club AGM which President and Secretary will be arranging shortly.