Sweet and sour for Grapes in their mission for First Division crown

THE Grapes played catch up in the Widnes & District Pensioners Bowls League this week.

They finally visited Bold on Wednesday where they had great success.

They managed to restrict Bold to one winner, Jim Forester (21-19), and had the best winner of the match in Ray Worthington (21-7).

The Grapes won the match by 38 chalks. Then a day later they had the tricky job of going to Rainhill.

This time they had five of the eight winners.

In the first four, Joseph Knockton (21-9) was the one winner for Rainhill and with the other three games being close The Grapes were just one chalk ahead.

In the second half, Rainhill had two winners – Gordon Lowe (21-6) and Derrick Sparkes (21-18).

The three winners for Rainhill proved to be enough for them as they dealt the title hopes of The Grapes a massive blow by winning by nine chalks.

Even closer was the match at Bold on Thursday where the home side faced Widnes Bowling Club No1.

Jim Forrester once again led the way for Bold in the first four. His 21-7 success was one of three for Bold at that stage.

Then, Brian Young (21-5) and Alf Stevens (21-6) led a strong comeback by Widnes.

However, the home side held on to deny Widnes by just five chalks.

The First Division leaders, Eccleston took advantage of this slip by The Grapes by winning at Fords No1.

This victory was set up by their first four, led by Ian Gerrard (21-4) who all won and put Eccleston 30 chalks up.

This was too big a hurdle for Fords who could only pull back nine chalks in the second half.

Terry Roach (21-2) led Halewood No1 to a good home win against Subscription No1. He was well supported in the second half of the match by John Kelly who won 21-5 as Halewood got home by 32 chalks having had six winners.

In the other top flight match, Moorfield No1 backed up last week’s win by beating Willow Brook away by 20 chalks. Their five winners included George Leishman who triumphed 21-7.

Last week’s leaders in Division Two, Victoria Park No2, were brought down to earth with a bump by their visitors Castle Park who started in fine style, winning all of the first four games.

This left the visitors 29 chalks up.

Although Victoria Park had three winners in the second four they were unable to dent Castle Park’s lead and lost out by the same 29 chalk difference that was established in the first half.

British Plate are once again occupying first place in Division Two. They had six winners in the first half of their match at Dundalk Halton who could not hold on to a three chalk lead gained in the first half.

Moorfield No2 faced a Victoria Park No1 side who could only field seven blocks. However, the visitors had four of the seven winners including Des Code (21-3), Mick Littler (21-4) and Derick Mellor (21-8) and ran out winning the contest by eight chalks.

The Ball’s brief spell of good wins came to an end at Runcorn War Memorial Club where they could not recover from a first half margin of 12 chalks in favour of the home side.

In the second half, Dave Everitt’s 21-8 win was more than matched by Ron Houghton’s 21-7 success for the home side who won by seven chalks. ● Division Three round-up – see panel (left).