Harry Nimmo, smaller companies specialist at Standard Life Investments, edged up to within a hairsbreadth of pole position UK-wide as he held top spot in The Herald's monthly table of the best-performing fund managers working for Scottish outfits.

Nimmo, who runs SLI's £365m UK Smaller Companies fund, held Resolution Asset Management's David Clark at bay with an improvement in his UK-wide ranking from third to second when performance figures for the three years to November 30 were tallied by financial publisher Citywire.

He now finds only Georgina Brittain, who runs JP Morgan Asset Management's UK Smaller Companies fund, between him and top place UK-wide.

But Clark, who manages Glasgow-based RAM's Smaller Companies fund, remains firmly in contention at the head of the Scottish top flight.

Clark, who had in late summer ended Nimmo's previous record-breaking, 10-month Scottish reign to spend two months at the top of The Herald's table himself, continues to snap at Nimmo's heels with an improvement in his UK-wide ranking from fourth to third.

Nimmo and Clark remain way ahead of the pack in the Scottish top flight. Closest to them now is Stephen Adams, who runs the Aegon UK Equity fund and saw his UK-wide ranking improve from 44th to 21st when the latest performance figures were tallied.

Edinburgh investment boutique SVM's founder, Colin McLean, has meanwhile been climbing the Scottish league at speed and is now fifth, with his UK-wide ranking improving from 47th to 30th in the latest month. McLean appears to be faring well relative to his peers in the current difficult market conditions.

In contrast, Aegon's David Roberts and Philip Milburn, Baillie Gifford's Lynn Dewar and Stephen Rodger, and SLI's Lesley Duncan were all relegated from the Scottish top flight when the latest performance figures were compiled.

A bid for online auction company Tradus, formerly QXL Ricardo, from Naspers of South Africa, has boosted Nimmo's fund recently.

Tradus is the fund's second-largest holding.

Nimmo, meanwhile, cited a further boost to shares of Asos, his fund's fourth-largest holding, following strong results from this online fashion retailer.

He highlighted strong share price performance recently from Irish bookmaker Paddy Power, his fund's largest holding, and engineering design software company Aveva, the third-biggest investment.

Although he noted a hit to the portfolio from a profit warning from Clapham House, the company behind the Gourmet Burger Kitchen, Nimmo believed the investment style of his fund should leave it relatively well placed amid ongoing financial market turbulence and a slowdown in economic growth.

He said: "There is a strong focus in the market on safety, on fairly defensive stocks that are immune or less affected by the economic cycle or turmoil in markets and economies and just have growth businesses that are powering ahead in spite of the state of the economy."

Nimmo added: "There will be a fair amount of suffering as I think there will be a slowdown in 2008 in the UK. Some smaller companies will (take a) hit, particularly at the cyclical end. I think, if you stick to high-quality businesses, you will be in good shape."

He cited bull and pig semen company Genus as another holding with good prospects.

Nimmo noted increasing demand for Genus's products from the likes of China, India, and Brazil.

He pointed to an increase in "meat-eating" in these countries and a move from "peasant agriculture" to "more industrial-scale farming" as they faced up to the challenge of feeding rapidly-growing urban populations.

The Citywire survey focuses on open-ended funds aimed at retail investors. It does not cover managers of investment trusts or funds for which the minimum initial investment is more than £10,000.

Fewer than one-fifth of fund managers in the UK qualify for one of the 204 Citywire ratings.