Grand Masters European Trophy
Southgate, London 22-28 August 2015

Scottish Thistles were in Pool 1 of the Over 60 Tournament Trophy with Alliance, England LX Red and Netherlands 2. Pool 2 included England LX White, Germany 2, Southern Cross and Welsh Dragons. The teams finishing first and second in each Pool took part in the 1-4 play offs, the winners going on to the final and the losers to the 3rd/4th place final. The teams finishing third and fourth in each Pool play off in the same way for places 5-8. After finishing fourth in Pool 1, Scottish Thistles played Welsh Dragons, 3rd in Pool 2, for the right to play off for places 5 and 6. A 3-0 win, their first win of the tournament, set them up to play for fifth place on Thursday 27 August against Alliance, who once again proved too strong, beating Thistles 6-2 to leave Scottish Thistles in sixth place in the Tournament Trophy.

The two England LX teams contested the final, which England LX White won after a penalty shoot out. Southern Cross won bronze after beating Netherlands 2 in the 3rd/4th place final.

Sat 22 Aug

ALL 2 LXR 3

NED 5 SCT 0
(Koziolek 2, Aalbers, Boertje, Beversluis)

Netherlands started on the offensive and pinned Scottish Thistles back for the first five minutes, but the Thistles midfield started to win possession and the Scots (with a number of English guest stars) began to press. Unfortunately, the final ball into the circle invariably went to a Dutch stick and the Scottish attacks came to nothing. A quick Dutch break down the left led to Koziolek scoring. Almost at the start of the second quarter, Aalbers netted after two other Dutch players had transferred the ball quickly about the circle. Boertje added another Netherlands counter towards the end of the quarter, leaving the Dutch ahead 3-0 at half time. Scottish Thistles were denied a stonewall penalty in the third quarter when Beale's stick was played in the act of shooting. A fourth from Beversluis short corner put the match beyond Thistles and, in the dying seconds, Koziolek latched on to a through ball to sweep in his third past the helpless Higham in the Scottish Thistles goal. 5-0 was a cruel result but Thistles should be proud of how well they played in what was, for many of the players, the first time they had played together.

Sun 23 Aug

ALL 10 SCT 2 (Bateson, Michalik)
(Haigh 3, Ahmed 3, Tresise,
Shepherdson 2, Sohal)

Scottish Thistles ran into a barrage of goals from a strong Alliance team which converted the majority of its chances to take its goal tally into double figures. Scottish Thistles could not match the Alliance conversion rate though they did create a number of good chances, managing to score only two. Alliance raced into a 5-0 lead through Haig (2) and Ahmed, with two more from penalty corners scored by Tresise and Shepherdson before Bateson reduced the deficit for Scottish Thistles just before half time and the half ended with the score 5-1 for Alliance. Michalik restored some hope by scoring from a short corner to make the score 5-2. However hope was extinguished by Ahmed and Haigh (completing his hat trick) and Ahmed scored in quick succession before the end of the third quarter to make it 7-2. It took till 62 minutes before Alliance scored again through Ahmed, and the roof fell in within four minutes when field goals from Shepherdson and Sohal took the total to ten and the final score to 10-2 for Alliance.

LXR 1 NED 1

Mon 24 Aug

LXR 2 (Hubert, Furneaux) SCT 1 (Gallacher)

Scottish Thistles reserved their best result for the match against the team which ended up as group winners, taking the lead through a Gallacher penalty corner after 15 minutes but being pinned back after 50 minutes by Hubert from an LX Red penalty corner, and finally defeated by a field goal by Furneaux five minutes later.

ALL 1 NED 1

Wed 26 Aug

WDR 0 SCT 3 (Bateson 2, Donald Dunbar)

Scottish Thistles finally came good in the last quarter of their rain-delayed play off match against Welsh Dragons, Paul Bateson scoring in 57 and 66 minutes and Donald Dunbar making sure of it with a penalty corner goal in the last minute of the match to make the final score 3-0. They now faced Alliance once again in the playoff to decide fifth place.

Thu 27 Aug - Final Placing Matches

SCT 2 (Raper, de Mattos) ALL 6 (Satvarg, Haigh 4, Hayer)

Scottish Thistles stunned their cosmopolitan opponents by taking the lead in 14 minutes through Keith Raper, but the lead lasted only two minutes before Satvarg put Alliance level. The second quarter went badly for Thistles, with goals by Haigh in 19 and 24 minutes sandwiching an effort by Hayer in 22 minutes, to put Alliance 4-1 up at half time. The third quarter saw no more goals but Brian de Mattos gave Scottish Thistles a lifeline with a goal in 56 minutes. However Haigh netted for his hat-trick on 61 minutes and followed up in 65 minutes with his fourth goal to end the match 6-2 in favour of Alliance. Considering the scratch nature of the Scottish Thistles team and the constant changes of personnel, sometimes leaving them quite short, sixth place was not a bad return in the tournament.

Pool 1 Table

Final Positions

1. England LX White
2. England LX Red
3. Southern Cross
4. Netherlands 2
5. Alliance
6. Scottish Thistles
7. Germany 2
8. Welsh Dragons

Squads

Alliance

England LX Red

Netherlands

Scottish Thistles

Paul Bateson, Jon Beale, Donald Dunbar, Ian Dunbar, Colin Gallacher, Richard Higham (GK), Tim Lorimer, Neil Macleod, Ian McCreath, Brian de Mattos, John Michalik, Dick Pearce (GK), Keith Raper, Tony Walker, Neil Ward, Peter Westbrook.
Managers: George Finlayson, Neil Mackenzie & Eileen Pearce. Coach: Murray Paton.

Welsh Dragons

Grand Masters Reports

Senior Grand Masters Reports