Page 11 - SMI Spring 2017 Revised

Page 11:Layout 1 26-Apr-17 9:30 AM Page 1

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Ireland take the team title yet again!
Ireland take the team title yet again!
The team title has been competed 28 time on Short Mats and twice on other types of Short games,
the latter being in the very early days of the Championships, in 1988 and 1989. of the 28 Short
Mat team championships, Ireland have won 25, with England 2 and Wales 1. So this is effectively
an annual championship to see who will come second to the Irish and this year it was the Welsh
by just 12 shots with Wales an England level on points. Each team of 16 players in four rinks
played the other countries twice, with each rink playing 12 end games.
Having finished third the previous year, in their opening match England faced Ireland and
were promptly blown away 67 - 37. Unusually, England failed to win a single rink and the best for
Ireland was an 18 - 10 result for Alan Paul, Mark Wilson, Stuart McSorley & Joseph Beattie. Wales
opened against Scotland and were pushed all the way, scraping home 46 - 43 with both sides
winning two rinks each. Best for Wales was Andrew Hudson, Nick Evans, Jac Edwards & Andrew
Evans with a 15 - 11 scoreline. Scotland’s best win came from Lawrence Moffat, David Kelly, Fred
Wyness & Bill Fraser with a 15 - 12 win.
In the second round Scotland faced the might of Ireland and were well beaten 69 - 20 with
all four rinks going to Ireland. Kevin Conroy. Gerry McCabe, Andrew Leckey & Shane Hand
weighed in with a 19 - 2 game. Wales faced England, with each team winning two rinks but the
overall result was decided by a stunning 17 - 3 game from Andrew Hudson, Nick Evans, Jac Ed-
wards & Andrew Evans. Best for England came from World Pairs champion Chris Willies along
with Alan Jones, Adam Smith & Adam Sultana, who won 17 - 9 but England went down overall 48
- 43, really hurt by the 3 - 17.
The third round saw Wales facing Ireland and what a cracker it turned out to be. In the end
Ireland won by just two shots at 42 - 40. Ireland won two rinks and Wales one, with one drawn.
The Welsh winners by 10 - 7 were Sean Hughes, Andrew Evans, Allan Slattery & Tom Harris. By
the same 3 shot margin, Colm McHugh, Damien McElroy, William Morrison & Brian Rankin won
13 - 10. The odd statistic from this match was that all four Welsh rinks scored 10 shots. Completing
this third round, England had a comfortable 55 - 36 win over Scotland with three rinks winning
and one drawing. The Scots draw was earned by Sandy McDonald, Debbie Cochrane, Paul Ged-
des & Helen Muirhead. It looked as though a win was on the cards leading 14 - 12 with just the
last end to go until Chris Willies Rink scored a two for a draw. Beast for England with a 15 - 8 were
Roger Wiggins, Gareth Davies, Jon Pitcher & Ryan Knight.
In the repeat of the first round matches, the England team finally turned up facing the chal-
lenge of top team Ireland. England winning two of the four rinks losing just one and the other draw.
However, a 15 - 4 game from Kevin Conroy, Gerry McCabe, Andrew Leckey & Shane Hand wiped
out the difference from their two losses and Ireland won 44 - 37.