Football
The big talking point of the week is the resignation of Hibs manager Pat Fenlon who announced his departure at the Friday press conference.
Fenlon’s future had been in doubt following Hibs’ League Cup quarter final defeat to Hearts on Wednesday, a result which sparked a demonstration by supporters outside the Easter Road West Stand, calling for the manager’s head.
Speculation mounts as to who Fenlon’s replacement will be with Inverness Caledonian Thistle manager Terry Butcher the favourite.
On the field, Jimmy Nicholl took charge as Hibs travelled to Fir Park on Sunday, but the change of management failed to inspire the team who lost 1-0 thanks to a first half header from Stephen McManus.
Across the city, Hearts hopes of avoiding relegation took another setback with a 2-0 home defeat to St Johnstone at Tynecastle. Nigel Hasselbaink opened the scoring after 30 minutes then Steven May added a second after the break.
Scottish Sun Lowland League
Keith McLeod grabbed his second hat-trick in seven days as Spartans hammered Vale of Leithen 5-0 at Victoria Park.
The Ainslie Park outfit took the lead in the 21st minute when Keith McLeod who beat the offside trap before slotting the ball low past O’Brien in the Vale goal.
Spartans doubled their advantage thanks to an own goal by Young following some good work by Jack Beesley.
McLeod then had a shot cleared off the line by Young before, Motion shot home from 20 yards to make it 3-0.
Spartans’ fourth came from the spot after Young brought down Bremner and McLeod converted the resultant penalty kick for his second of the day.
‘Cloudy’ added his third and Spartans’ fifth after latching onto a Bremner pass before sliding the ball under the keeper into the net.
Full Time: Vale of Leithen 0-5 Spartans
Malt and Hops Man of the Match: Keith McLeod.
Elsewhere Edinburgh City beat East Kilbride 3-1 away from home.
East of Scotland Leagues
Central Taxis Premier Division
Craigroyston 4-0 Civil Service Strollers
Heriot Watt University 3-4 Tynecastle
Spartans 2-1 Edinburgh University
Stirling University 2-3 Coldstream
Central Taxis First Division
Burntisland Shipyard 2-7 Easthouses Lily MW
Hibernian 6-0 Peebles Rovers – Jason Cummings (4) David Paul and Jamie Beaton
Kelso United 4-2 Eyemouth United
Berwick Rangers 1-2 Ormiston
Hawick Royal Albert P Duns
Women’s Football
Scotland’s women maintained their 100% winning run in World Cup qualifying with an impressive 4-0 away victory against Poland.
Jane Ross scored a hat-trick for the Scots with Joanne Love scoring the other.
Scotland’s next qualifier is at home to Poland on 5 April before travelling to Bosnia five days later.
In the last league fixture of the season, Hibs beat Spartans 5-1 at Albyn Park thanks to goals from Sarah Laverty (2) Lizzie Arnott (2) Lucy Graham,
Rugby by John Preece
Week 11 of the RBS Premiership saw a 2-1 win ratio for Edinburgh sides. Heriots narrowly lost 11-9 at Gala, while Edinburgh Accies and Currie both won. Accies hammered Aberdeen Grammar 42-26 and Currie had an equally impressive, but probably infinitely more welcome, win against Stirling County in Stirling, 27-10.
Heriots losing bonus point takes them to within a point of Melrose at the top (Melrose lost to Ayr) with 37 points. Accies climb up to sixth from last week’s eighth, with 23 and Currie, although still firmly rooted at the bottom, close the gap to Stirling to 3 points, with 10 league points to their name.
In the RBS National League, Boroughmuir suffered their first defeat of the season, 13-10 at home to Stewarts-Melville. Watsonians unfortunately lost out to Selkirk, going down 18-15 at Myreside.
Boroughmuir still lead the table, but are now ‘only’ 11 points clear of second. And it is Stew-Mel who have now taken second place with 38 points, leap-frogging Watsonians who are now in third with 36. Still, it’s looking good the Edinburgh sides looking for any play-off positions that might be on offer at the end of the season, although Selkirk and Dundee are only a couple of points in arrears and are sure to want some sort of say in the matter.
The Women’s Sarah Beaney Semi-Finals have been decided – at some point in the past it would appear as the SRU fixtures seem to have been a bit ambiguous – and Murrayfield Wanderers and RHC Cougars won through to play Hillhead/Jordanhill and Melrose, respectively, away from home in March.
Edinburgh Rugby managed their second home win in a row against Italian opposition on Friday night as they beat Zebre 25-23 in a very close fought match. They survived a very tense final few minutes to win and go up to eighth in the RaboDirect PRO12 table.
Web – http://www.photoboxgallery.com/jlp-photography
Ice Hockey
Saturday: Braehead Clan 3 Edinburgh Capitals 1
Peter Holecko gave Capitals the lead at 16.27, before Clan equalised 14 seconds later through Matt Haywood.
Neil Trimm then edged Clan ahead before at 22.03 Joel Champagne added a third goal for Clan to give them a 3-1 lead.
There was no more scoring and Clan ran out worthy winners.
On Sunday, the Capitals lost 4-6 to Dundee Stars at Murrayfield.
Speedway
Commiserations go to Scotwaste Monarchs who pushed Somerset right to the wire, before going down 49-44 on Monday night and 92-89 on aggregate in the Premier League Championship final.
Meanwhile the Club’s End of Season Dinner and Dance will take place on Saturday evening at the Edinburgh Capital Hotel.
Anyone attending the event should note that the postcode shown on the ticket is incorrect and following that will take you to Musselburgh on the east side of the city rather than Clermiston on the west side of the city. The correct postcode is EH12 6UG.
Basketball
Boroughmuir Blaze lost 90-62 to Clark Eriksson in the Senior Men’s League whilst St Mirren West Scotland College beat Polonia Phoenix 59-43 in the Senior Women’s League.
Volleyball
Scottish Division One Men
South Ayrshire 1 3 Edinburgh Jets
City of Glasgow Ragazzi 1 3 City of Edinburgh
Dundee 0 3 Bon Accord
Glasgow Mets 3 0 Beacon Fire
Scottish Division One Women
Su Ragazzi 1 3 City of Edinburgh
QTS Kyle TA 0 3 Edinburgh Jets
QTS Troon Team Ayrshire 3 0 Aberdonia
Edinburgh Jets II 0 3 North Lanarkshire
Division Two East Men
NUVOC 3 0 Beacon Flame
Su Ragazzi II 1 3 Bellshill Cardinals
Edinburgh Jets II 0 3 City of Edinburgh II
John graduated from Telford College in 2010 with an HNC in Practical Journalism and since then he worked for the North Edinburgh News, The Southern Reporter, the Irish News Review and The Edinburgh Reporter. In addition he has been published in the Edinburgh Evening News and the Hibernian FC Programme.
