Five Arches 73 St Issells 77
Saturday brought our first away fixture of the season with a trip to sunny Saundersfoot. After the win in the first match, hopes were high to continue this good start but St Issells have proved to be a bogey team for the Five Arches in the last couple of years. So a tight, competitive match was expected.
After a warm welcome from Captain Barry , the action commenced on a glorious afternoon. On rink three, Clive led his team of Eamonn, Ben and Mike to a useful 10-5 lead at tea, but then the wheels fell off. They failed to score in the next 6 ends and trailed by 19-10 , after a brief rally by the rink, the Saundersfoot quartet piled on the pressure once again to pull away and run out eventual winners by 26 shots to 14. Rink four saw Captain Ashley standing in for the holiday bound Roy Powling as skip. A close fought affair saw the St Issells rink have a 8-6 lead at tea. The reviving effects of PG Tips and digestive biscuits, aided by good performances from Dai, Tony and Gwyn encouraged the rink to move head and win by 23 shots to 15.
The remaining two rinks had extremely close games, Lee and his team of Ken Lloyd, Ben Cloake and new Five Arches player Ray Taylor edged their match
by one shot in 20-19 victory. There was never much between these two rinks, a decisive three on the 18th end gave the Five Arches rink a small lead which they held onto. Tony's rink of Doug , John and returning Steve, playing his first league game for 25 years had a ding dong game in the far off realms of rink six. With the sound of village cricket in their ears, they failed to score for the first 6 ends but a fine comeback ensured a nail biting finish and they just fell short to lose by one shot.
The game was played in a good spirit and was not decided until the final bowl. After the win against St Thomas in the first game, this was a disappointing result for the Five Arches, however full credit must be given to the St Issells team for their great team performance.
Eamonn Maher, Ben Simmons, Mike Gouldingay, Clive Webb 14 R Pring 26
Dai Rees, Tony Powling, Gwyn Beynon, Ashley Hooper 23 B Lee 15
Ken Lloyd, Ben Cloake, Ray Taylor, Lee Richards 20 S Howe 19
Doug Silcox, John Hubbard, Steve Williams, Tony Brown 16 K Rowlands 17