Team Henderson took a major step towards holding onto the women’s title at The Hardie Engineering Scottish Curling Championships when they clinched a 9-5 win over the competition’s top ranked side in the last of their round-robin matches in the Dumfries Ice Bowl.
A steal of two at the third end saw them claim the upper hand early on in their meeting with European Championship bronze medallists Team Morrison and while the world number 18 ranked quartet of Rebecca Morrison, Jen Dodds, Sophie Sinclair and Sophie Jackson managed to draw level heading into the final end, Fay Henderson held her nerve to produce a raise takeout with her final delivery to secure the victory.
“This was obviously the first goal for the week, getting to the final and giving ourselves a great chance,” the skip said afterwards. 
“Obviously, we’re not finished yet as we hope to do the same in the final, just as we did when winning last year’s title as well, but we’re just glad we’ve secured our place after a really good game of curling.”
Operating as a five player team this season, Henderson, Robyn Munro, Hailey Duff, Katie McMillan and Lisa Davie have steadily climbed the world rankings since winning this title a year ago.
“We’ve got two new players, so it’s been a bit of a different start to the season, while we’ve welcomed Clancy Grandy on board as our coach as well and we’ve just gelled together really well,” said Henderson.
“We’ve put a really good season together, we’ve worked our way up and followed our processes to hopefully give ourselves our best chance here.”
She noted that the recruitment of Grandy, who until last season was skipping one of the leading teams in Canada, had been particularly beneficial, given her understanding of the elite women’s game.
“It’s great to have a fresh perspective, especially from the women’s game, which is something a little bit different,” Henderson observed.
“Women coaches are something we don’t get very often, so it’s been nice to work with her.”
As they bid to set up a re-match, Morrison’s women now face a semi-final against Team Watt’s juniors who completed an excellent round-robin campaign with a 9-3 win over Team Smith.
“So far we’ve had a good week in the round robin and we’ve been making a lot of great shots,” said their skip Laura Watt. 
“There’s a great buzz around the arena so we’ve been really enjoying it so far.
“We’re excited to be in the semi final tomorrow morning and we’re going to go out and play our best curling.
“We had a close game against Morrison which came down to the last stone so we’re ready to play them again.
“We can take some confidence from it but we know we need to bring our A game to win.”
With more teams involved in the men’s competition, four teams will contest the semi-finals with world number one ranked Bruce Mouat, Grant Hardie, Bobby Lammie and Hammy McMillan earning top spot at the end of the round-robin after coming back from 6-2 down at the halfway stage, to claim a dramatic 9-8 extra end win over defending champions Team Whyte.
They will now meet the all-teenage quartet of Team Carson, the Scottish Junior champions of the past three seasons, after they clinched their semi-final spot by beating Team Waddell 6-5.
Whyte, Robin Brydone, Duncan McFadzean and Euan Kyle will meanwhile have a re-match of last year’s final when they meet third place finishers James Craik, Mark Watt, Angus Bryce and Blair Haswell in the semi-finals.
Watch every live streamed game from Curling Stadium Europe.
Please click here for the draw and results.
Images: PPA / Graeme Hart
