Taieri Lakes overcomes Clair Saints

THE wild, wet and windy weekend proved to be a leveller during the fifth round of the Metropolitan senior A pennant series.

The St Clair Saints suffered their first loss at the hands of Taieri Lakes while the Devils continued their giantkilling ways at Balmacewen, beating the B52s and creating a logjam with three other teams on nine points — three behind the Saints.

The Bombers finally got the monkey off the back over Chisholm Links but it was not all plain sailing.

At Taieri, the home side pipped the Saints 3.52.5 in a nailbiter.

Taieri Lakes — missing Matt Tautari — now emerges as a serious threat in the series.

Ryan Bellamy landed the first blow from the middle order for the Saints, beating Jaxon Boyes 6/4 before Lakes secured 2 wins at the tail through Ken Shaw and Matt Mercer.

When Saints No 4 Cody McMullan squared the ledger at 22, the focus turned to the final group which favoured the home side.

Both Lakes players — Hayden Robertson and Mark Andrews — were 2 up with 2 to play against Matt Crawford, who replaced Conor Jamison due to illness, and Jacob Bellamy respectively.

Both Saints players won the 17th setting up a grandstand finish. When Bellamy secured a half with Andrews it came down to a 7m putt holed by Robertson that proved to be the difference for the home side after Crawford failed to make his 2m putt to draw the fixture.

At Balmacewen, the Chisholm Links tail wagged against the Bombers with debutant Blair Liffiton halving with Duncan Croudis and Mike Weastell beating Dylan Stock to give the visitors an early lead.

However, that was as good as it got, the home side coming home strongly in the testing conditions.

Links No 4 Matt Heaton came close to earning points going down to Luke Murdoch on the final green, while Ben Patston John McIntee and Brandon Hodgson all recorded 3/2 wins for the Bombers. The 4.5 1.5 victory lifts the Bombers off the bottom of the table into 5th above the Links on games.

Also at Balmacewen, the Devils upset the B52s to continue their upward momentum.

Big wins from Logan Clarke and Callum White put the Devils on the front foot before B52s’ Chris Snow got the home side on the board over Ryan Littlejohn.

Devils middle order players Jake Bleach and Luke Worthington iced the cake with wins while the muchanticipated battle between B52s No 1 Tom Lee and Phil Bungard had no bearing on the result as Lee handled the conditions better winning 4/3.