Denny Plate delight for slick Shields
The North East claimed three titles in the National Championships in the past week.
South Shields cruised to victory in the Denny Plate final.
Even without England international David Bolt. the final was plain sailing for the confident Shields outfit, who ran out 97-47 winners with 13 ends unplayed.
Jaxon McKenna, Paul Sainthouse, Stewart Hubbard and Shaun McIntosh eased to a 30-9 win over Tony Aubrey, while brother Ian McIntosh steered Neal Ridley, Stevie Cairns and Ian Riches to a 279 win over Barry Williams.
Scott Baker, Mal Peach, Phil Dixon and Kris Storf defeated Martyn Chant 22-15. with the remaining rink of Dave Paterson, Josh Minto, James Sneller and Gary Farquhar completing the whitewash by grinding out a 18-14 win over Gordon Ballantyne.
The second national title came in the men’s Over50s triples, as Hartlepool’s Ian Jackson, Dale Oram and Glenn Skipp defeated Malvern Hill’s Mike Holmes 18-15.
Redcar’s Kath Delacoe and 82-year-old legend Beryl Alderson beat Lincoln’s Lin Mountain 15-12 in the final of the Over-60s pairs.
South Shields head to New Earswick today to face Nottingham in the Top Club semifinals, missing David Bolt and the McIntosh brothers.
Shaun and Ian McIntosh head to Nottingham tomorrow for the latter stages of the family pairs, tackling Riverain’s Jamie Claydon in the last 16.
Houghton brought down the curtain on their Top Ten campaign at Stanley.
It has been a mixed campaign for the Houghton squad and sadly ended with another 8-2 defeat.
Frankie Froud had a tough time in the singles against former England lead Bret Arkley as the Stanley star cruised to a 21-4 win.
Houghton’s only bright spot came in the pairs, as Michael Wright and Peter Thomson (jnr) recovered from 14-11 down, with two ends left, to beat Derek Craig 16-14. In the triples, Karl Armstrong, Stevie Tindale and Richie Mckie were left to rue dropped counts of five and seven as they lost 18-13 to Brian Houghton.
Eric Downes, Richard Thorpe, David Wright and Terry Todd were unlucky in the fours. They led 13-9 with four ends to play, but Todd lost all four ends to succumb 16-13 to Joe Dixon.