SCOTLAND star Michael Bremner got his Commonwealth Games off to an impressive start despite eventually falling to defeat against heavily touted South Africa.

The home side, under the stewardship of Derek Forsyth, suffered defeat at the hands of the South Africans for the third time in six weeks with second half strikes from Andrew Cronje and Ignatuis Malgraff handing the visitors a 2-0 win at the National Hockey Centre at Glasgow Green.

A further 6-2 defeat to India leaves the Scottish hopes of qualifying hanging by a thread despite a 4-3 win over Wales.

Kilbarchan star Bremner admitted he was disappointed with the opening defeat, but could see positives in his own performance, he told Gazette Sport: “It was a really, really tough game out there today but we have prepared very well for this competition so we are disappointed to have lost in all honesty.

“I think we had more than enough to win the game — corners, breakaways and opportunities going forward but we defended really well so we are just going to take the positives into the rest of the tournament and other games and then build upon them as well.

“I’m very happy with the way I played but we have all put a lot of time and effort leading in to this so we are just going to continue working hard and just go out there and try and impress so yeah I’m pretty happy with that performance.

“Overall we are just taking it game by game, so today we may not have won but we will look to rectify that in the remaining games. We now just need to re-group, reassess and it is now all about recovery until the next match. Then hopefully we can pick up a win.” Despite an impressive opening 35 minutes Scotland struggled to dominate against South Africa as both Kenny Bain and Chris Grassick failed to find the target.

The South African’s sensed blood and with Scotland down to 10 men they won a penalty stroke after Ross Stott illegally blocked an effort on the line with his shoulder.

Andrew Cronje stepped up to take the stroke himself and with the clocking ticking away Ignatuis Malgraff confirmed the win with close range effort to seal the deal for the South Africans.