Scotty Stevenson: Pakistan's bowlers run Glasgow curry kitchen

Pakistani lawn bowlers and owners of The Ali Shan Tandoori Restaurant, Ali Shan Muzahir, left, and Qureshi Ayub Mohammed.

Pakistani lawn bowlers and owners of The Ali Shan Tandoori Restaurant, Ali Shan Muzahir (left) and Qureshi Ayub Mohammed.

For 27 years Mr Qureshi Ayub Mohammed has been cooking his curries in a small kitchen on a corner site in Battlefields. His business partner Ali Shan Muzahir doesn't go in for the flaming pans. Instead he is front of house, in the small restaurant that bears his name, the one festooned with the flags of the Commonwealth, where the locals descend for their kormas and pakoras, or maybe for a little something from the special Commonwealth Games Menu.

Whatever they choose, they're bound to enjoy it. Qureshi and Ali have built a reputation as purveyors of arguably the best Indian food in Glasgow, which is some honour.

The First Minister is a regular, and there are photos to prove it. And when they set about breaking all sorts of copyright regulations by emblazoning their specials menu with the Commonwealth Games logo, the chairman of the organising committee personally paid them a visit. Not to reprimand them for their insolence but to be the first to order.

By all accounts, not much has changed in The Ali Shan Tandoori Restaurant since the two friends opened for business in 1987. It is a modest room which pays homage to the ageless and classic subcontinental dining design aesthetic, upholstered in burgundy and accented in Pakistani green.

For their part, Qureshi and Ali are accented in Glaswegian, though their Pakistani roots still rise through the Scottish brogue. They came to Glasgow in the late 1960s, established a friendship through restaurant work, and have been together - after a fashion - ever since. Ali laughs when he thinks about the length of their business partnership.

"We should probably just get married. It's legal here now," he says.

It is not exactly legal in Pakistan, though, which brings us to the question of why it is we are standing in a tandoori restaurant in a leafy south side suburb of Glasgow talking to the Glaswegian Pakistani equivalent of a culinary Bert and Ernie. And the answer is this: Qureshi and Ali have become famous for something other than their tikka masala. They are, you see, Pakistan's first Commonwealth Games lawn bowlers.

Now, you're thinking, "Pakistan? In the Commonwealth?" And that's okay, we all are. But that aside, and you have to admit it, two curry cooks from Pakistan walking on to the greens at Kelvingrove this week to represent a nation they left 40 years ago in the very town they left it for is exactly the sort of story that makes these Games what they are.

And they're no slouches either. They've been at the Clarkston Club for more than 20 years. It was their bank manager who put them on to it in the first place. They were looking for ways to get the restaurant's name out there. He suggested they sponsor the bowling club. They did. He suggested they may as well roll a couple of seeds as well. They did.

Before they knew it -- and this is the way of bowls -- they were hooked on the game. Ali's been club champion and competed with distinction at a district level; they both have their coaching certificates framed on the wall in the restaurant, next to a newspaper cartoon of Qureshi rolling a poppadom out the kitchen door in the fashion of an easy forehand draw.

They're justifiably proud of representing Pakistan at the Games. Ali will skip the triples. Qureshi will go second. Their teammate hasn't arrived yet -- he is the only one that lives in Pakistan. For all we know he could be the only lawn bowler in Pakistan. The federation was incorporated only four years ago. You would have to call it a growth sport.

Qureshi and Ali won't face New Zealand in the group stage but they have already crossed paths, in a sense. The Ali Shan Tandoori Restaurant provided the catering for New Zealand's practice session last week. One hundred curries were delivered. In a sport famous for it's self-catered, bring-a-plate lunches, this is something else.

Qureshi and Ali probably won't win at the Commonwealth Games, but it won't matter. Theirs is a story that reminds us there's more to life and sport than merely coming first.

On a wall in the restaurant are tacked a collection of cards from customers. Each one has a personal message of congratulations and a well wish for the games. They're lovely and sentimental and utterly sincere. The men for whom they are for beam when you point them out.

Who needs a medal, when you've already won?