SHANDON’S Fiona Burnet and her Scotland team-mates finished on a high note after what their coach described as a “bittersweet week” at the EuroHockey Championships in Monchengladbach.

Head coach Chris Duncan says the Scots will learn “huge” lessons from their experience at the tournament after they finished the competition with a fine 2-1 win over Spain, ranked number eight in the world.

Burnet, who plays her club hockey for Wimbledon and represented Scotland at her first Commonwealth Games in Birmingham last summer, was part of an 18-strong squad named for the biennial competition.

Burnet, a former pupil at Lomond School in Helensburgh, and her team-mates put on a brave showing in their opening match at the competition, but found their German opponents too strong, with the host nation chalking up a 4-0 win.

A disappointing display in a 5-0 loss to Ireland followed before defeat by the same score against a much-fancied England team left the Scots at the bottom of their pool.

Amy Costello blasted a penalty corner into the net to give the Scots their first goal in the competition in a 1-1 draw against Italy, before Duncan’s squad belied the 11-place gap in the world rankings between themselves and Spain to win their final match 2-1, with Costello on target again and Charlotte Watson adding the second.

Goalkeeper Amy Gibson pulled off a sensational penalty save with two minutes remaining to prevent the Spaniards levelling the tie, earning the Scots seventh place overall in the final tournament standings.

Speaking after the Spain match, Duncan said: “It was a battling performance and I’m so proud of the effort, and dedication to task that the players showed. This was more like what we want to show.

“We were mindful of their threat, and knew they’d give us challenges, so we set up to manage them and catch them off guard, which we did. We deserved our goals.

“We knew they’d come back, but we stuck to task, and I’m really happy with our defence under pressure. They threw everything at us, but we were resolute.

“All in all it’s a bitter sweet week for us. We were great on opening night, that’s how we want to play against a top side, but we’re on a journey, and we’re developing, and the lessons from this tournament will be huge for us.”