Friday brought the second day of the Bowls England National Finals, and it was a mixed day to report in terms of results.
First in action today was St. Georges Dragon Chris McGready, who continued his pursuit of the national title with the 2nd round of the national singles. Chris was up against Royal Wootton Basset BC and Wiltshire’s Graham Hatherall, and Chris recorded a great win 21 – 9. Next up for Chris, was former England International and Norfolk singles champion in John Ottaway. And Chris continued his great form, and despite being 9 – 1 adrift, Chris pulled this deficit back to only trail 10 – 6. This pattern continued and Chris took the lead, and only needed one shot, leading 20 – 16, as we know sometimes trying to get the last shot is the hardest one to get. Ottaway pulled it back, scoring a 1, then a 2 to trail Chris 20 – 19. Chris with his third bowl on the end drew the shot, which left Ottaway with last bowl trying to draw the shot, Ottaway stalked the bowl but the bowl ran past Chris’s shot and Chris recorded another great win. This means Chris is through to the 1/4 finals tomorrow am, and will take on Leicestershire’s Darren Allsopp at 9:30am.
Club Double 4’s
Gosforth BC played their 1/4 final this afternoon against Worcester BC. The game started relatively well for the Gosforth team, with Yeomans leading 5 – 0, and Richardson only being 1 behind. Yeomans was pulled back to 8 – 7 going through 10 ends, and Richardson was also level at this same point. Richardson lay a count of 6 on the next end, but Worcester’s skip Andy Wills managed to pick the jack up, and score a vital shot. A couple of ends later Richardson lay another 5 or possible 6, but Wills again managed to get second shot. At the same point Yeomans lead had been overturned, and trailed by only 2 shots. But with 2 ends to go Richardson was 4 ahead, and Yeomans was only 1 behind. The last end for Yeomans was in play, and facing 2 shots against, Chris played over the strength to move the jack through, as the Northumberland side had bowls past the white. Chris connected with the jack, but the jack rebounded of a back bowl and moved back up the rink and to the side, and instead of collecting 3 or 4 shots, they dropped 3. So this meant Richardson required a single to take the game in to an extra end or a double to win the tie. The end was played out and unfortunately the Gosforth side could not remove the Worcester shot bowl, and went down overall by 2 shots (29 – 31).
We wish Worcester BC the very best of luck tomorrow in the semi-final, where they will face Leicestershire’s New Lount BC.