Bowls: Edinburgh and Leith aim to bounce back after loss

EDINBURGH & LEITH'S bowls team hope that Robert Marshall is the answer to the ills they experienced in an opening fixture defeat to Midlothian in the Scottish Counties Championship and welcome the Slateford maestro back for the match against Stirling County East at Carronshore tomorrow.

Marshall – a veteran of 12 international series and a three-time Tait Trophy Champion – takes over at skip from Jamie Gracie and, with lead Dougie Martin unavailable, his front three are John McDermott, Gracie, and Alan Brown.

Gavin Smith is switched to third for team captain Mal Higgenbotham and Graham Munro to second, otherwise the E&L selectors are sticking with the team that went down on three of the six rinks against Midlothian.

Midlothian are rightly cock-a-hoop after their shock away win over E&L but make two changes against Fife at Newbattle with Graham Walker and former East Lothian star Colin Bonner coming in at the expense of Tommy Russell and Neil Melrose.

East Lothian lost away to West Lothian in their opener and make a forced change against Borders at Dunbar with Ronnie Branley drafted in to replace David Oliver, who has announced his withdrawal, due to a back problem, for the rest of the campaign.

Borders are always respected by the teams from Edinburgh and the Lothians and could prove troublesome after an encouraging opening home win over West Fife.

West Lothian hope to continue on a high and the defending national champions are unchanged for their visit to West Fife at Townhill, Dunfermline.

• THE opening round play in the E&L Coronation Pairs saw Craig McCall and Kevin Hunter of Craigentinny edge a cross-town confrontation with a 13-12 win over Slateford at Colinton.

Balerno evened up that score in runaway style with former cap David Lees and Frank Millan crushing Willie Burgess and George Kyle of London Road Foundry 23-4 at Dean.

Parkside look to have the title favourites in Hamilton Trophy players Alex Hurry and Robert Donaldson and they looked the part with a 22-11 win over Bert Cunningham and Jimmy Bathgate of Ferranti at Craigentinny.