Exciting finish to excellent Winter League campaign
THE FINAL round of games in Halifax Bowling Club’s winter league produced an excellent finish to what has been a superb season, with both divisions producing very close results.
Champions from last season Clayhouse (Paul Gill, P Oliver, Hedley Kettlewell, P Hilliary), were up against relegation threatened Four Play (Ray Clegg, Keith Hanson, Derek Williamson, Dave Russell) and needed to score as many points as possible.
With both teams having something to play for, the scene was set for an exciting encounter.
Four Play rose to the occasion with Clegg, Hanson and Russell all registering important wins as Four Play ran out 19-18 winners leaving them with a total of 224 points.
Clayhouse had finished their fixtures on 262 points.
In the afternoon session, second in the table Whirls Wizards (Lorraine Hirst, Shirley Dillingham, Mick Skuse, R Gartside) needed 20 points to become champions in their game against relegated Simply the Best (Julie Best, Lyn Carter, Lyn Saxby, Julie Mallinson).
Hirst and Skuse registered wins for Whirls Wizards and Carter and Mallinson replied for Simply the Best.
Carter restricted Dillingham to 15 and Mallinson did the same against Gartside as Whirls
Wizards could only manage to score 18 points leaving them in second place behind Clayhouse. Linndley finished in third place. Simply the Best and Firey jacks were relegated.
In Division Two, Sowerby had led the table all season with Pellon moving into second place after their emphatic win, the previous week against Halifax Extra.
In their final game in the morning session Pellon (P Steele, David Agnew, Paul Firth, David Gowing) beat bottom of the league Halifax Ladies (Ann Mullaney, Linda Robson, Ann Oates, Helen Smith) by 24 points to 5 to finish their season with a total of 273 points.
That left Sowerby (Pat Skene, Glenda Hartley, Peter Lomax, Les Mitchell) with the task of scoring 20 points in their game against Blue Sox (Neil Dickie,
Dave Harrison, Martin Forster, Peter Gregory).
In a nail-biting game Sowerby managed to score three sets of maximum points as Skene beat Dickie, Hartley defeated Harrison and Mitchell beat Gregory.
However Forster, for Blue Sox, played his long mark game to perfection to restrict Sowerby player Lomax, to one point in a 21-8 victory.
Sowerby finished on
the same number of points as Pellon with a total of 273 points.
As Pellon had won 12 games compared to Sowerby’s 11 games, Pellon finished as champions with Sowerby runners up. Kingston finished in third.
Next season Sowerby and Pellon will be promoted to Division One.
The prize money was presented by Halifax Bowling Club’s president Ray Clegg.