Sunday, May 31, 2015

Spell Bound

First things first- after yesterday’s defeat to Inveraray in the Camanachd, Glen know where we stand and where we must focus for the rest of the season. There is first the MacTavish final which has been reached for the third year in a row and then, beyond that there is the business of consolidation in both leagues for both teams.
After the heady experiences of the last few years it is disappointing to be back down to earth with a bump especially when with a little bit of bite up front another day in the sun or at least in partial sunlight was beckoning.
What happened to the cheery note that used to run through the “D”?  Life intruded perhaps but for “life” in this instance read Inveraray. After leading the first half by a goal which sneaked through the Inveraray’s goalie’s legs-he’ll be glad the TV cameras were absent-Glen lost out in the second to a fine strike from Davie Macpherson and another from Ewan McMurdo after the red and blacks had wasted a pile of chances in front of goal. And that result came about despite the fact one of their top front men Grant Griffin found himself side-lined with an injury. How come their old guys can score better than our young guys?
 
“Oh dear, how sad! Never mind” as the late Windsor Davies was prone to say to the moaners in his troupe of entertainers in “It Ain’t Half Hot, Mum”. Mr Google will help with the reference if you’re baffled. There are much bigger things to be concerned about.

One of these for instance is the subtle change in the spelling of this Glen. A while back Roy the Glasaich asked about the appropriate spelling of this particular geographical location.
“How do you spell the name of the Club?” he said.
“Why do you want to know? “said the Wing Centre suspiciously because you know that when one of the Glasaich asks a question of a Glenner there is definitely an ulterior motive. Roy came out with some flannel about a sports editor at one of the Inverness weeklies wondering in a spirit of genuine enquiry what the definitive spelling was.
The Wing Centre was unwilling to commit. After all the sports editor guy only had to go onto the Camanachd website to find out that it was spelt/spelled “Glenurquhart.”

That set the Wing Centre to wondering though what was the correct way to spell what required to be spelt/spelled.
Have to say that was a fine way to waste a weekend. The first point of reference was MacKay’s “Urquhart & Glenmoriston” (pub 1893). Interestingly while running Glenmoriston together he spells Glen-Urquhart thus. The late Prof. Peter English in his book on the Glen (pub 1985) refers to both Club and Glen as Glen Urquhart while a programme for the Glen Highland Games (1985) says “Glenurquhart”. “Glen Urquhart High School” appears on a sign adjacent to “Glenurquhart Primary School”.
 Hugh Dan in “Shinty” (pub 1993) says “Glenurquhart”. A host of programmes (not really a host- for how many cup final programmes do the Glen really feature in?) switches back and fore between GlenUrquhart, Glenurquhart and Glen Urquhart-MacKay’s hyphen having dropped out of the running completely it would appear.
The earliest to hand is one for the Frew’s Trophy, Saturday 30th June 1973 and it says “Glenurquhart”

But here’s a thing- the Wing Centre was of a mind to claim that Glenurquhart had become the settled, definitive spelling of the people as the 70s, 80s and 90s moved into the noughties. Gradually he became aware that the website had taken on a “GlenUrquhart” flavour though the www. bit still retained the “glenurquhartshintyclub.com”. Then he checked up on the MacTavish posters: in 2008 we were Glenurquhart; in 2013 we were Glenurquhart but by 2014 we see to have defaulted back to Glen Urquhart.

What will this year’s MacTavish poster be like? Glenurquhart? Surely not GlenUrquhart!  A word with a capital in the middle seems bizarre. Much better to give us back our hyphen and revert to MacKay’s original Glen-Urquhart.  Who is behind all this shape shifting anyway? No doubt the Camanachd President will have a view – at times like this the temptation is to move to Fort Augustus, a place named by two words and totally without any controversy. Or should that be Kilcumein?


The other big thing of a controversial nature is why should the bowlers drive over the pitch to get to their green? You cannot imagine bowlers being allowed to drive over the Eilean or the Dell to get to the rink, though the surface at An Aird might well be improved if bowlers were actually to be allowed to drive over it. That last is perhaps a little unfair though because the word on the street is that Fort have taken over the maintenance of the park for themselves and no doubt it will come on in leaps and bounds.
In GlenUrquhart, Glenurquhart or Glen-Urquhart though, bowlers seemingly are able to exercise some ancient “droit de seigneur” and take their vehicles across the grass at the A82 corner while they would appear to have a perfectly good parking place at the Druimlon side.
Enough already-the Wing Centre is getting roused over trivialities when the real thing that is annoying him is the defeat by Inveraray. Grrr!
Donald Cameron's pic of Neale Reid accurately sums up just about how all Glenners felt after the game.

The other illustrations are chosen from amongst Sheena Lloyd’s snaps of the Skye match and the programmes are from the Wing Centre’s heap of rubbish in his “room” which his good lady keeps threatening to throw out unless he can prove he has a genuine research based reason for keeping them. This piece should prove his case-for the time being.
 Q.E.D.


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