Scottish University Open Outdoor Regionals Preview

Rory Curran finishes off UKU University regionals with Scotland.

Scottish Uni Open Outdoor Regionals will have a different look and feel about it this year. With the introduction of a Women’s sanctioned event running along side the main BUCS open qualifier it’s unlikely many girls will feature in the main event (though they will be fighting for medals of their own). Another change is the introduction of upfront bad weather arrangements meaning teams will travel safe in the knowledge they will be settling nationals qualification one way or another, with most regionals in recent memory having been rained off, this is a luxury that those from the drier side of the country may take for granted. Another big change in Scottish Ultimate is the fact that Edinburgh, after at least a decade of top two finishes, are no longer considered to be part of the top two north of the border their demise has been likened to that of Manchester United, with some going as far as saying Man U and Ro Sham Bo alike are top Division material.

Edinburgh in the final last year, can they repeat? Photo courtesy of Andrew Moss.

Scottish Uni Women's Indoor Regionals

With Open regionals over we move to Women's. The UU committee have surveyed the Women's captains and Rory Curran, Glasgow (FarFlung) captain has written the preview for Scotland from this resource.

Scottish women’s teams have a very strong history of success at women’s indoor university nationals. Since the 2007-8 season a Scottish team has placed on the podium every single year, more impressive still in the same time period they have provided seven of the ten finalists, and even more impressive than that is the fact that those honours have been shared amongst no less than four teams. Most impressive however is the fact they cleaned up last year taking three of the top four with only the Irish (excluded this year) from the podium clean sweep. Clearly this weekend’s tournament will be a closely contested and high quality affair.

Dundee women much like there male counterparts will start the tournament as strong favourites.

The Grapevine - 01/11

This week's Grapevine features pieces looking forward to next year, as well as the re-emergence of indoor ultimate...

From abroad - Skyd brings us an insight into the ever entertaining Seattle Sockeye's success this season...

An 'Ultimate Mom' gives a fresh perspective of our sport...

Ben Wiggins considers the importance of next year's WUCC...

From home soil - The University season is well under way, check out the indoor regional final footage from Scotland, South West, and North regions...

And finally - as if Ultimate players needed their egos inflated...

This week we reached 100 posts on the ShowGame! Thanks go out to all of our contributors!

Halcyon's Jake Aspin makes the grab. Thanks to LOVE ultimate for the action shot!

Keep tuned for more University coverage in the coming weeks on tSG... As always, if you've seen something interesting that we've missed, let us know! JCK @ tSG

UKU Regionals Preview - Scotland

Ben Heywood of Understanding Ultimate fame and Glasgow Ultimate player tells us how he thinks Scottish regionals will go down. Scotland has 1 bid to Nationals and will be held this Sunday.

A real match?

For the first time ever, Scottish Regionals might just see a contest.

In the past, everyone has always known that Fusion would qualify, and the whole thing has just been a chance to get a few games of Ultimate. Fusion would enter two teams, split evenly so that they'd get at least one reasonable game when they played each other.

Last year, Abstract came very close to an upset against one of the Fusion teams, but no-one had any serious expectations of beating both of them and taking the Nationals spot. This year, it all looks very different.

Glasgow Ultimate have emerged as an A Tour squad, winning promotion from an incredibly competitive B Tour 1 and (just) holding on for the rest of the season despite never quite having the full squad out there. They even gave me my first taste of A tour in 9 years, which shows how short they must have been...

Glasgow at T2 in Nottingham. Photo courtesy of David Sparks.

And Fusion? Well, I don't think they can complain if I say they've had a 'mare. A little unlucky with the opponents they drew at Tour 1, they just barely avoided relegation to the C tour; and then, doubtless on the back of that result, failed to get a team together for the rest of the season. They've had a couple of guys away with U23s, and a lot of old hands have retired or focussed on Mixed with Black Eagles.

But Fusion are back... A team has emerged for regionals, and doubtless they want some revenge. It'll be a very interesting match up. Fusion has no obvious weaknesses - they're all young and quick, and they can all throw. But they perhaps lack the experienced general, the one truly top-class player that will bring them together. When they disagree, who has the authority to really take charge?

Whereas Glasgow probably have the top 3 or 4 players in the tournament, better than anything Fusion have on the preliminary roster I've seen, and a good crowd of skilled and drilled athletes to back them up - but also a few who wouldn't have matched Fusion on an athletic level until Phil Webb's weekly boot camp. It'll be fun finding out how much that fitness has paid off....

I suspect the game will be decided on the Glasgow leadership's superior tactical experience - they'll know how to use which players in which situations, whereas Fusion's even roster will mean everyone is trying to win the game themselves rather than sometimes defer to a stronger team-mate. I predict Glasgow by 4. But I suspect Fusion may have something to say about that...

Or maybe there'll be a shock? Sneeeky's have impressed me this season with some solid results and some very solid performances, though they'll probably lack firepower against the top 2 teams' strongest lines. And there's talk of Black Eagles entering - which frankly means anything at all could happen. Some of their guys are top class - the kind of players who used to see Fusion into the A Tour top 4 - and their best girls (if they bring some?) can compete against anybody. Who knows? Maybe even Abstract will get a team together for the first time this year.

But here's my prediction (even though I don't yet know which of these teams will turn up!):
1 Glasgow 1
2 Fusion
3 Black Eagles
4 Sneeeky's
5 Glasgow 2

Read more of Ben's work on Understanding Ultimate! DP @ tSG.