Edinburgh side Grange came within five minutes of making EuroHockey League history but ended up losing 2-1 after London-based Hampstead & Westminster snatched two goals in the final five minutes, the game-winner coming in the last second.
Earlier, Scotland’s top domestic marksman, 21-year-old Fraser Heigh (pictured), scored a spectacular opener against the run of play, rampaging down the right hand side and leaving veteran Kwan Brown in his slipstream before firing home at the near post past stunned goalkeeper Toby Reynolds-Cotterill after 19 minutes.
Heroics by Glasgow-born Grange goalkeeper David Forrester and dogged defence kept the Scots ahead in a fiesty game in glorious weather at Terrassa, near Barcelona, but the former English champions, who boasted Olympian Rupert Shipperley in their ranks, piled on the pressure, earning a series of penalty corners.
The Scots still frustrated their rivals and, with the clock ticking down, forced the English side to withdraw their goalkeeper to have 11 outfield players.
Grange were within five minutes of becoming the first Scottish side to win a game in the EuroHockey League and the first Tartan team to beat an English combine in Europe’s top club competition.
But Matt Guise-Brown converted from a penalty corner, firing low and hard to the right of a diving Forrester with five minutes left and then a driving run down the right saw the ball arrive on the stick on Matthew Ramshaw who fired home from close range past the diving Forrester in the last second.
There was not enough time for the match to re-start and several of the Grange players fell to the ground in total frustration at what might have been after having a historic result snatched from them.
EuroHockey League Ranking Cup: Grange (Edinburgh) 1, Hampstead & Westminster (London) 2 (in Terrassa, Spain)
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