Mitchell pulls out of Tait in favour of team

TAIT TROPHY bowls great Colin Mitchell elected to pull out of last night's second round of Edinburgh & Leith's top showcase Champion of Champions event in favour of representing Carrick Knowe in the quarter-finals of the Edinburgh Top Ten.

"I tried to reach an alternative arrangement with Chris Steven of Pilrig, who was in the same boat as me but he had an Edinburgh Bowls League decider on Wednesday and an EBL singles on Thursday, so he was unable to accommodate me," said Mitchell.

"I wanted to support the team effort in the Top Ten rather than the individual aspect of the Tait, so I informed E&L that I was withdrawing," he added.

Unfortunately, the hosts for the tie, Brunstane, hadn't been informed of the withdrawal and had prepared a rink, arranged a marker and an umpire and had a large disappointed crowd who had turned up to watch the tie of the night. Pilrig were denied the services of Steven for their major Top Ten clash against defending champions Sighthill as the player turned up at Brunstane where he enjoyed a walkover.

"If E&L had informed me that I had been awarded the tie then I could have diverted to the Top Ten. Instead, I was left twiddling my thumbs," said Steven.

However, Steven's interest in the Top Ten was continued with Pilrig scoring a 6-2 points victory over Sighthill.

David Poole beat Gary Purdie 21-12 in the Singles on the Pilrig home leg but Jason Ronaldson produced a great result for last year's champions when he skipped Graeme Eddington, Ross Noble and Alan Scott to a 19-11 win over Keith Taylor in the Fours.

The downfall of the holders came on their own home patch with John McDermott and Jamie Gracie losing 15-13 to Ewan Craig and Darren McKenny in the Pairs while Gavin Smith skipped the Pilrig rink to a 12-11 win over Paul Noble.

Carrick Knowe also progressed but it was on shot margin after sharing the points 4-4 with a Parkside team that was handed an early advantage with Alex Hurry's 21-15 home win over Richard Tough in the Singles.

But Alan Poole countered that for the visitors by skipping Kevin Tennant, Robert Mitchell and John Mitchell to a 25-14 win over Brian Salvona in the Fours.

At Carrick Knowe, Colin Mitchell skipped Craig Aitken to a 17-9 win over Darren Grant and Robert Donaldson in the Pairs, which meant they could affords the 15-12 defeat suffered by Darren Hush at the hands of Paul Veitch in the Triples.

Seafield won on shots against Colinton and Currie beat Leith 6-2.