FORMER Ladies European Tour player Lesley Nicholson became the first woman to play in the East Lothian Winter Golf League for a quarter of a century as she paired up with her brother Keith.

The duo dealt out a 4-2 win on Sunday against Musselburgh Old’s Scott McFarlane and Tyler Hood.

And the win for team Nicholson helped Haddington to a 4-1 scoreline and a place on top of the Division 2 table.

The league recently voted to allow women to play and skipper George Blair was the first team manager to take advantage of the rule change, as Lesley proved that the ladies weren’t there just to make up the numbers.

Meanwhile, Royal Musselburgh joined Haddington at the top when Jamie Ramsay’s side made the most of their first home appearance of the campaign, handing out a whitewash against promotion hopefuls Tantallon.

In the top flight, Gullane strengthened their position with a second consecutive win on the road.

Experience was the key in another close scrap at Musselburgh, where the home side arrived at the closing five holes ahead in three matches and level in one. The visitors then made their experience count as Duncan Low’s precise pitch to the 18th salvaged a half against the home team’s star pairing Benn McLeod and Connor Good, then in the anchor match Rob Jack and Lawrie Main took the last two holes to win their match.

In between there was an uncharacteristic mistake from Musselburgh’s Ian Fyfe when he hooked his approach into trees at the 15th, losing his ball and the hole when it seemed more likely he and partner Scott Greig would go two up.

In the end the visitors won two matches and the other three were halved, leaving Jeff Aitken’s side on maximum points from their first three outings.

Glen moved into second spot when they edged out their hosts Longniddry.

And after yet another close encounter the 2011 champions will welcome the opportunity to consolidate their position on home turf as they welcome defending champions North Berwick and league leaders Gullane in the next few weeks.

North Berwick got off the mark with an emphatic home win against Kilspindie, while Dunbar were never troubled on their visit to Craigielaw.

Thorntree let the chance of a win slip away as Whitekirk finished strongly.