Selkirk hockey star Sarah Robertson played a prominent role at the weekend as Great Britain’s ladies guaranteed themselves a place in next year’s Olympic Games in Tokyo.

The GB squad – currently the defending Olympic champions – were involved in a two-way play-off against Chile on Saturday and Sunday, with the aggregate score determining who would make the flight to Japan in 2020.

The UK ladies won 3-0 on the first day, at the Lee Valley Hockey and Tennis Centre in East London, and followed that up on Sunday at the same venue with a 2-1 win.

Sarah, who has around 140 international caps for Scotland and Great Britain, figured largely in a midfield and attacking role – and her performance might have been boosted with the knowledge that, on Friday, she was named ClubSport Ettrick and Lauderdale’s Sports Personality of the Year.

Wearing number 10, Sarah took a number of the penalty corrnes during Sunday’s second leg and often tried to instigate attacking moves.

She collected a superb long-range aerial pass from Giselle Ansley after 11 minutes and showed great control on the left but could not turn around to get her shot away.

Sarah had a quiet second quarter by comparison but, in the third, she was presented with a superb chance to score a goal. From a free hit in the 36th minute, the ball came across from Lily Owsley and Sarah scooped a shot towards goal from only four or five feet out – but it was scrambled away with a skilful one-handed push by Chilean ‘keeper Claudia Schuler.

Sarah represented an even more threatening presence for the Chileans in the final quarter and Owsley pushed the ball through to her on the right, in the opening minute, but it just ran too far ahead of the Selkirk player.

Sarah put the ball across face of the goal after another attempted attack in the 49th minute and won a free hit, while late on, she tried to burrow the ball out from under the ‘keeper’s body, following great skill once more from Owsley.

GB won the game with goals early in the first quarter by Tessa Howard and Laura Unsworth, while Fernanda Villagran pulled one back for Chile after 57 minutes of the hour-long game.

London-based Sarah plays her club hockey these days for Hampstead and Westminster, who have made a strong start to their campaign this year in the English Premier League, having won promotion last season.

She travelled extensively over a six-month period with the GB women’s squad in the FIH Pro League and, earlier this year, she was part of the Scottish squad which contested the EuroHockey Championship II in Glasgow. The Scots were aiming to win promotion to the top hockey division in Europe – and they won every game to realise their goal.

Scottish Borders Council leader Shona Haslam is hoping to swap Newtown for Westminster after announcing that she will be running for a seat at next month’s UK Government general election.

The Tweeddale East councillor has been selected as the Conservatives’ candidate for Lanark and Hamilton East in South Lanarkshire at December’s election.

In a tweet yesterday, the mother of two, of Peebles, wrote: “I’m absolutely chuffed to bits at being selected as the candidate for Lanark and Hamilton East.

“I will work so hard to win this marginal seat.

“Only the Scottish Tories will stand up for the union and against the Scottish National Party.”

Mrs Haslam has been leader of the council since May 2017, overseeing high-profile capital projects such as handing out iPads to every high school pupil and drawing up plans to rebuild the region’s schools.

Her Conservative administration, propped up by independent councillors, has also funded two community action police teams, tasked with patrolling the Borders and tackling community priorities such as drug dealing, antisocial behaviour and speeding. 

However, not all her policies have been so popular.

After raising council tax by the maximum allowance of 3% in December 2018, Mrs Haslam’s administration then decided to raise the council tax by a further 1% two months later.

The ruling Conservatives have also made cuts to popular services such as grass-cutting, libraries and rural bus routes.

Lanark and Hamilton East, held by the SNP’s Angela Crawley since 2015, is one of the most marginal seats in Scotland, having been held by a majority of just 266 at 2017’s general election.

Ms Crawley, the SNP’s spokesperson for women and equalities, polled 16,444 votes that time round, little more than half the 26,976 she got two years earlier.

Conservative contender Poppy Corbett was in second place with 16,178 votes, and third-placed Labour’s Andrew Hilland wasn’t far behind, with 16,084.

Mrs Haslam has confirmed that she will step down as council leader if elected, saying: “I am delighted to have the opportunity to stand as a candidate in this election in the neighbouring seat of Lanark and Hamilton East.

“With only an SNP majority of only 266 votes, it is a key marginal.

“The Conservative Party are the only party who are standing up for the union who have a chance to taking this seat from the nationalists.  

“If elected, I would have to stand down as council leader, which would be a huge regret for me.  

“I love being a local councillor and leader of the council but obviously could not do both – but there is an election to win first, and a lot of work to do.”

If elected, Mrs Haslam would be the first Borders councillor to move on to national government since fellow Tory Michelle Ballantyne secured a South Scotland list seat at Holyrood in May 2017, giving up her Selkirkshire seat on the council seven months later.

Next month’s election takes place on Thursday, December 12.

A fed-up mother of three has voiced her anger after her Hawick home was repeatedly targeted by vandals suspected to be teenage tearaways.

Chas Graham returned from a holiday earlier this month to find that a stone had been thrown through the living room window at her house in Burnfoot’s Ruberslaw Road.

To add insult to injury, a few days later she was sitting at home when two young girls flung eggs at the same window.

Chas, 49, and husband Neill, 56 – parents to three sons aged 10, 15 and 23 – have lived in the house for 16 years, and those vandal attacks are just the latest in a series of such incidents.

The couple’s front window has been smashed on at least four previous occasions and their car has been vandalised too, they say.

Chas, a worker at A1 Taxis in Hawick, has received dozens of messages of support since she posted a picture of her home being egged by suspected teenage terrors on Facebook.

She said: “There are a group of young upstarts that are terrorising Burnfoot and terrorising Hawick. I used to love living here, but there is no peace in our home anymore.

“We had been to Blackpool and came back and thought ‘what on earth is that?’ and then realised a pane of glass in the living room had been smashed, then eggs were thrown at the other pane of glass.

“My husband saw two girls running off, but it was dark and the curtains were closed and the neighbours didn’t see anything.

“I don’t think we are being targeted or that it’s personal because this is an issue for so many other people around here too.

“We’ve been in this house 16 years, and it has always been a problem, not just for ourselves but for the whole of the street.

“It’s just continual. We’re asked why we don’t move, but I’ve been in this house all those years, so why should I move?

“The front window has been smashed I would say at least four times and the side window broken once.

“The rear window of our car has been broken, the wing mirror has been kicked and the man who lives directly opposite had a brick put through his car window.

“If I could lift up my house, I would take it somewhere else.”

The family’s plight has sparked sympathetic responses on social media.

Anne Adams posted: “I grew up in Burnfoot, in Scott Crescent. It was a super place to grow up in, but that was in the 1960s.”

Louise Drummond added: “It’s awful that law-abiding folk are being targeted.”

Conservative incumbent John Lamont and Scottish National Party challenger Calum Kerr are to go up against each other for Westminster’s Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk seat for a third time, it’s been confirmed.

The pair have contested the Borders seat twice before, claiming one win apiece, and both the long-time rivals will fancy their chances of ending up third time lucky come the next UK Government general election on Thursday, December 12.

Mr Kerr claimed first blood when the pair initially crossed swords at the 2015 election, edging ahead of his Tory rival with a majority of just 328 after polling 20,145 votes, leaving former Lib Dem MP Michael Moore trailing behind in third place with 10,294 votes.

Mr Lamont turned the tables next time round, however, emerging triumphant at 2017’s election with a majority of 11,060.

The former solicitor polled 28,213 votes to telecommunications worker Mr Kerr’s 17,153, making the seat the Conservatives’ safest this side of the border.

That was third time lucky for Mr Lamont as, prior to being edged out by Mr Kerr two years previously, he’d lost out to Mr Moore in 2010, by 22,230 votes to 16,555, and in 2005, that time by 18,993 votes to 13,092.

The SNP finished fourth, after Labour, on both those occasions, with Paul Wheelhouse, now a list MSP for South Scotland, picking up 4,497 votes in 2010 and Aileen Orr getting 3,885 in 2005.

Mr Lamont and Mr Kerr are among four candidates so far to have thrown their hats into the ring for the consituency, the others being Liberal Democrat Jenny Marr and the Brexit Party’s Michael Banks.

Launching his campaign to be re-elected last Friday, November 1, Mr Lamont, 43, born in Kilwinning in North Ayrshire but now living in Coldstream, said: “Over the next five weeks, I will be out speaking to as many residents as I can to hear your concerns and priorities for the Borders.

“As your MP, I have held over 350 local advice surgeries, helped thousands of residents and always stood up for local services and local people. I would be honoured to be able to continue this work.

“I can sense that people in the Borders are scunnered with politics at the moment and I do not blame them, but in the Borders it is going to be a close contest between me and the SNP.

“Nicola Sturgeon has made it crystal clear that her number one priority from this election is another independence referendum.

“The majority of people in the Borders, no matter how they voted in the EU referendum, just want Brexit sorted and for the country to move on.

“The last thing the Borders needs and wants is to go back to yet another divisive referendum.

“The SNP want to put up a border at Berwick. I want to focus on improving public services and getting the Borders connected.”

Galashiels-born Mr Kerr, 47, now living at Cardrona, begs to differ, though, saying: “The message that I am taking to Borderers is that Scotland voted to remain in the European Union and Scotland’s needs are best served by maintaining the strongest possible trade links with Europe.

“The people of Scotland deserve the right to choose our own future.

“In the face of both Scotland’s views and needs being ignored by the UK Government, we must stand up and reject the kind of hard Tory Brexit that is already, before it’s even taken place, causing chaos for our farmers, our businesses and those EU citizens who have paid us the compliment of making Scotland their home.

“The fact is that Boris Johnson’s deal will be even worse for our economy than the deal struck by Theresa May, which was itself rejected three times by MPs, and the latest bad deal puts Scotland at a significant competitive disadvantage to Northern Ireland.

“It is also becoming clearer by the day that, under their proposed hard Brexit, the Tories will sell out Scotland’s health service and food standards in their desperation to strike a US trade deal with Donald Trump. I won’t stand idly by and let that happen.

“I loved every second of representing this constituency, and I recognise that to do so is an honour, not a right.

“Any MP must earn and sustain the trust of the area’s constituents. In the two years that I had the honour of representing the area I love, I always put Borderers and their best interests first, and I promise to do so again if the people of the Borders once again put their faith in me.”

A 21-year-old man has been left with facial injuries after being assaulted in Hawick town centre in the early hours of yesterday, November 3.

He was set upon by two attackers in Baker Street just before 4am.

Police are appealing to any potential witnesses to get in touch.

Detective constable Sandy Blacklock, of Galashiels police station’s criminal investigation department, said: “This attack on the victim has left him with serious facial injuries, and I am appealing to anyone who may have been in the area of Baker Street in Hawick to get in touch if they saw this altercation.

“We are reviewing CCTV in the area and, at this stage we are following a positive line of inquiry.

“Anyone who may have witnessed this incident is asked to call us at Galashiels CID on the 101 number and quote the reference 1,819 of November 3.

“Anyone who wishes to pass any information on and remain anonymous is asked to call Crimestoppers on 0800 555111.”

Police are appealing for witnesses to an early-morning disturbance in Galashiels to come forward.

Property including a television is reported to have been stolen during that disturbance in the town’s Talisman Avenue at 4.15am on Sunday, October 13.

A police spokesperson said: “A disturbance had taken place within a property at Talisman Avenue, Galashiels which has then spilled out onto Woodstock Avenue.

“When the occupier has returned, a number of items were missing, including a large black TV.”

Any witnesses are asked to call police on 101, quoting incident number 933 of October 13, or Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555111.