Author Archive | Editorial Team

The National Top Club Championship Finals were held in Torquay over the weekend of 16th/ 17th April. Sixteen clubs from across England competed in this event, having previously qualified in tournaments held in July last year and January this year. One club from the county participated having qualified last July.

County players representing the Churchill and Blakedown Short Mat Bowls Club, who competed in this event playing under the banner of “Richard’s Rebels”, were  –  Richard Rose, Terry Clifford, Trish Clifford, Ian Davis, Alan Walters, Sandra Felton, Dave Grove, and Malcolm Saunders.

The tournament started with 4 groups of 4 teams playing singles/fours/pairs and triples, with the top two teams from each group proceeding to a knockout stage for the main trophy..The third and fourth teams  in each  group competed in a knockout stage for the “Plate” trophy.

In the Group stage Richard’s Rebels competed against –  Hazelbury Bryan 1 ( Dorset ), Truro ( Cornwall ) and Smallthorne ( Staffordshire ). The results of the group stage are shown below :

Richard’s  Rebels v Hazelbury Bryan 1

Singles   won   10-6        Fours   lost   3-11       Triples   won   7-6        Pairs   drawn   10-10

Richard’s Rebels v Truro

Singles   won 15-8        Fours   Drawn   5-5    Triples   won   17-2     Pairs   drawn     8-8

Richard’s Rebels v Smallthorne

Singles   lost   6-10       Fours   Lost  3-15        Triples   lost    5-12       Pairs   lost      0-24

Richard’s Rebels competed in the “Plate” knockout, playing against Hazelbury Bryan 2 in the quarter  final with the following results:

Singles   won 7-6          Fours   won 14-3         Triples   won   9-8        Pairs   won     8-7

After a convincing quarter final win Richard’s Rebels faced Hollmans ( Cornwall ) in the semi final. – the results of that match are shown below:

Singles   lost   7-9          Fours   lost   5-11         Triples   lost 3-11          Pairs   lost     3-11

The ESMBA National Finals for 2016 have been scheduled to take place at Church Gresley Derbyshire  from the 2nd to 10th of April. The County were allocated 10 places with two places for Singles, Pairs, Triples, and the under 18’s, with one place for the Mixed Fours and Fours. County bowlers competing are shown below :

Mixed Fours   –  Margaret Powell, Johnathon Smith ( replaced by Richard Rose ), Sandra Felton, and Richard Payne.

Under 18’s  –  Phil Thompson and Leah Thompson.

Singles  –  Richard Rose and Ian Davis

Pairs  –  Richard Payne/Ian Davis   and   Malcolm Saunders/Jenny Gibbs.

Fours  –  Richard Payne/Richard Rose/Dave Grove/Anthony Ruddy

Triples  –  Dave Grove/Sandra Felton/Alan Walters   and   Tony Kilgour/Tony Crowley/Mark Bourne.

The progress of the county teams in each of the disciplines is shown below :

MIXED FOURS ( 2nd APRIL ).

UNDER 18’S  ( 3rd April )

SINGLES (7th April)

PAIRS (8th April)

FOURS ( 9TH APRIL )

TRIPLES ( 10th APRIL )

The County Squad for the 2016 – 2017 season is set out below :

The date for the Gilt Edge Presentation Evening has now been changed to Tuesday 29th March.

The Short Mat Players Tour  ( SMPT  ) staged their latest tournament  –  the English Masters  –  at Bromsgrove Indoor Bowls Centre over the weekend of the 6th and 7th of February. This was one of five major tournaments the SMPT stage at Bromsgrove throughout the year, with other major tournaments being staged in Northern Ireland, Cyprus, Norway and Sweden. English masters is an open singles competition with 144 bowlers from several countries participating, including three from the Worcestershire Short Mat Bowls Association  –  Richard Payne / Jim Tingle / Malcolm Saunders. Bowlers were randomly drawn and allocated into groups of six with group matches being played prior to a knockout series.  With 24 mats in use there was plenty of activity over the weekend. Following completion of the group matches the top two bowlers proceeded to the main cup knockout series with third and fourth players competing for the “Plate” trophy and the fifth and six players competing for the “Shield” .

Richard Payne, with two convincing wins  ( 21-8 and 10-5 ) proceeded to the “Plate” competition where his first knockout match resulted in a walkover because   his   opponent was absent sick. Richard won his second knockout match 11-6 and as a result proceeded to the quarter finals where unfortunately he fell short with a 4-10 defeat. In spite of this Richard was well pleased with his overall performance.

Jim Tingle also had two comfortable wins in the group stages  ( 12-9 and 14-7 ) and as a result of these wins proceeded to the “Plate” knockout stage of the tournament.     Unfortunately he was unable to take part in this part of the tournament because he was unwell.

Malcolm Saunders also had two wins in his group stage ( 10-6 and 11-9 ) to maintain the trend set by Richard and Jim of proceeding into the ” Plate” knockout stage of the tournament. In the “Plate” first round knockout, Malcolm narrowly lost his match 7-8 in what was a very low scoring game.

Overall it was an extremely enjoyable weekend of bowling against some of the best in the country and indeed in Europe.