IRISH curlers will be gathering at Lanarkshire Ice Rink, Hamilton this weekend (18/19th January 2014) for the annual Four Nations Curling Championship and this year Ireland are hosting the event.

Last year saw Ireland beat Scotland but lose to Wales and England. The previous year Ireland won two trophies and the year before all three,  so let’s all hope that the emerging pattern here doesn’t come to it’s natural  conclusion with Ireland winning zero trophies in 2014!

Ireland participates in three of the seven inter country trophy challenges, playing 4 games in each (1 mens, 1 ladies and 2 mixed). The winner is the country with the highest aggregated shots up total over all four games.

The trophies competed for during the Four Nations weekend are:
* Marshall Millennium Trophy (Scotland versus Ireland)
* Meikle Trophy (Wales versus Ireland)
* Turnbull Trophy (England versus Ireland)
* Welsh Stone (Scotland v Wales)
* Kay Trophy (England v Wales)
* Tom Ballantyne Trophy (England v Scotland men)
* Connie Miller Trophy (England v Scotland women)

Irelands game times are as follows:

Saturday 18th – 9.00am – Men & Women V Scotland / 12noon – Mixed V Wales / 3.00pm – Mixed V England.

Sunday 19th – 9.00am – Mixed V Scotland / 11.30am – Men & Women V Wales / 2.00pm – Men & Women V England.

The 26 plucky volunteers representing Ireland on the ice this year are:

Starting of course with John Burns (our long suffering serving secretary and moving alphabetically through the ranks, Steve Callan, Arran Cameron, Yvonne Chalmers, Paul Cromey, Helen Cross, Claire Darragh, Francis Donald, Christine Furey, John Furey, Alison Fyfe, Bill Gray, Carolyn Hibberd, David Hume, JohnJo Kenny, Clare McCormick, Alan Mitchell, Jim Nixon, Kathie Nixon, Marie O’Kane, Tom Roche, David Smith, Margarita Sweeney-Baird, Craig Whyte, Frances Whyte and not forgetting Peter JD Wilson.