Benfield BC won Saturday’s Challenge Cup, with Portland BC runners up.
Saturday brought the last Men’s Cup Competition to be concluded. From the previous Saturday with 6 sections being played – it brought the winners of each of the sections. The finalists were Portland, Cramlington, Rothbury, Willington Quay, Forest Hall and Benfield.
Our hosts for the final, as previously reported was Portland BC – and I must say they were fantastic hosts, as normal.
On to the play itself, and the beauty of the Challenge Cup is it is unknown the winners until the final session, but through the day there were some significant bowls, key ends and of course key results. On the first session it brought last years runners up, and also 2021 champions Rothbury up against Benfield. The skip for Rothbury was Graeme Donkin and his opposite number was Benfield’s Jonty King. Rothbury had or seem to have a slight upper hand in the game but King played some decisive bowls throughout, but the key one was his last bowl of the game. With the game deliticaly poised and Rothbury held a two shot lead and in the head lay 6 shots. King with last bowl in hand managed to navigate through the front bowls, and moved the jack 2 – 3 feet and in to two other Benfield bowls and collected a treble, so instead of perhaps being 7 adrift, Benfield won by 1 shot.
So after two games played no one had won the 4 games combined (as it in Rink A and Rink B playing twice). As normal the double header after lunch generally gives a picture or who is leading, and again this was key to the outcome of the Challenge Cup. In the double headers Cramlington played Willington Quay, and despite Dave Clough being 1 down against Tony Errington, Bob Harrison won by 5 against Paul Elliott, enabling Cramlington to win by 4 shots and collect the 2 aggregate points. Forest Hall played Rothbury and one rink was up and one down, Forest Hall’s Joe Harrison beat Graeme Donkin by 7 but Donkin’s club mate Mark Heron won by 11, so won by 4 overall. The last double header saw hosts Portland take on Benfield, and this was tight throughout, Portland’s young Gren Richardson beat Benfield’s Jonty King 9 – 7, but Benfield’s Rootham beat Sir Bob Liddle 12 – 6, so again like all of the double headers they won by 4 shots and duly collected the 2 points.
In session 4 Benfield had to overturn a 5 shot deficit against Cramlington, and they duly did with Jonty King winning 11 – 3 against Dave Clough. And at the same time Portland overturning a 3 shot deficit against Rothbury, where young Gren beat Rothbury’s Mark Heron 13 – 3.
So after this session was concluded Benfield looked to be pole position as they had won all their games, but were facing Rothbury with only a 1 shot lead. But waiting in the wings were Portland who had only lost one game, which was to Benfield in the double header, and also Rothbury had only lost the one game as well. Portland were taking on Cramlington and Bob Liddle was 4 adrift at the start of the game but overturned this to win by 8, and overall by 4. The other Portland rink skipped by Gren beat Forest Hall’s Joe Harrison by 6 and overall Portland won by 9. So all eyes were on the game of Benfield and Rothbury, and the game was tight both in heads and scoreline, as at 5 ends it was 5 all. Benfield’s Matty Bishop who was playing 3rd for Brian Rootham, played some great shots over the last 3 ends and Benfield edged ahead and won the game 8 – 6, and overall by 3 shots and collected the vital 2 points.
This result meant Benfield had collected a maximum of 10 points, Portland collected 8 points, Rothbury finished 3rd on 6 points, 4th place went to Forest Hall with 3 points, 5th place to Cramlington with 2 points, 6th place to Willington Quay with one point.
I would like to congratulate all players that played on Saturday – of course congratulations goes to the winenrs Benfield, and to the runners up Portland.
With Benfield collected this prize, it completes a cup double – as they won the Jubilee Cup earlier this year. Also on the last end or two news from Leamington Spa reached Portland with the fantastic news of the National title in the Mixed 4’s – with I know Paul was struggling a bit to concentrate on his game, with news of each end at Leamington Spa coming through.
The Benfield 8 consisted J Anderson, A Johnson, P Proctor, J King, P Carr, R Bishop, M Bishop and B Rootham,
The Portland 8 were W Thompson, P Magnay, J Bartlett, W Liddle, R Varley, J Wallace, R McAvelia, G Richardson.
A final thank yous goes to umpire Jason Proctor, many thanks for your time, hard work through the day. A final thank you goes to Portland BC, as highlighted earlier Portland accepted my late request to host – and as always were excellent hosts from start to finish. The green played well, good surface and pace to the green and please pass my thanks on to your green keeper as well – Lewis Wilson. But throughout the day any requests that arose were never a problem – thanks again for all your help and support.
CHALLENGE CUP WINNERS: BENFIELD BC
CHALLENGE CUP RUNNERS UP PORTLAND BC