Page 12 - SMI Spring 2017 Revised

Page 12:Layout 1 26-Apr-17 9:56 AM Page 1

12 Best for England were Roger Wiggins, Gareth Davies, Jon Pitcher & Ryan Knight with
a 14 - 11, with Chris Willies rink snatching a two on the last end for an 8 - 7 win. In the other
match Wales beat Scotland 65 - 32, helped by a 20 - 4 from Stephen Williams, Michael John, An-
drew Coghlin & Aled Humphreys. Lawrence Moffat’s rink took a three on the last end for an 11 all
draw, denying a clean sweep for Wales.
The fifth and penultimate round of matches saw a crucial clash between England and Wales.
To give themselves a chance of second place England needed to win and despite losing two of
the four rinks, their two winning ones were by bigger scores and England won the match 47 - 37.
England’s best rink was that of Lee & Bronagh Toleman with Gary Best and Danny Langdon
who won 15 - 5, along with a 15 - 9 from Roger Wiggins rink. Best for Wales was Luke Haddon,
Chris Martin, Andrew Jones & Chris McWhinnie with a 12 - 8 scoreline. Ireland, the unstoppable
force beat Scotland 59 - 28, with Colm McHugh (celebrating 25 years in the Ireland squad),
Damien McElroy, William Morrison & Brian Rankin weighing in with a 17 - 5.
In the sixth and final round no matter what the other teams did, Ireland were already Team
Champions and the also ran’s needed to be sorted. England needed to beat Scotland by as many
shots as possible but the Scots had other ideas and apart from one rink gave England a hard time
both teams won two rinks each but the 24 - 3 victory for Roger Wiggins, Gareth Davies, Jon Pitcher
& Ryan Knight effectively ensured England’s 52 -37 victory.
Scotland’s biggest win was a 13 - 5 scoreline for Robert McNeil, Gary Stewart, Kevin Peacock
& Yvonne Hiddlestone and helping to keep the score down, Jimmy Broatch, Stuart Hiddlestone,
Paul Walker, & Zoe Kirk won 14 - 11 with an astonishing finish running out from 4 - 11 taking six
ends in a row.
In their final game, Wales were looking to either beat Ireland or keep a low score defeat to
ensure their runners up spot. in the event they only lost one of the four rinks but were defeated 51
- 36. The damage was done Colm McHugh, Damien McElroy, William Morrison & Brian Rankin
who recorded a crushing 26 - 7 win, with the 19 shots deciding the match.
Overall, Ireland had 12 points, Wales
6, England 6 and Scotland 0. Wales
BRITISH ISLES CHAMPIONSHIPS took second place as they had a plus
BRITISH ISLES CHAMPIONSHIPS
of 12 shots to England’s 2. Wales thus
finished runner-up for the second year
in a row.
Looking at the comparative bowl-
ing numbers, Ireland easily has more
than 20,000, England around 19,000,
Wales with 2,000 and Scotland with
less than 500, which somewhat hand-
icaps them against the other Nations.

“A” Team Event
“A” Team Event
This championships is for “second”
teams and was intended to blood new
players and bring players forward It is
every bit as competitive as the Premier
event and played on the same format
“A” Singles Runner-up Osian Elias with as the Premier event and has now
Bromsgrove DC Vice Chairman Councillor been running for 11 years.
Malcolm Glass, ESMBA President George Clark The singles event is usually fairly
and winner Martin McNicoll open. Ireland have won 6 singles, with
England winning 3 and Wales 2.