On another autumnal evening Tenby faced Pendine at home last Friday evening. On the eve of the County Finals Tenby had their full side out save for the working Joe Richards. However with Ben Cloake as sub the team aren’t missing out on any class.  On rink one Cameron White found himself once again on his favourite rink and was quickly into his stride, this time being backed up by Dai Spencer who has played in every rink so far this year. With Pat Currie and Peter Day supporting this rink came out of the blocks quickly against the rink skipped by Stuart King-Thomas racing into a 9-0 lead. However the boys from Pendine showed great resilience and determination in bringing the game back to 10-7 after 10 ends. But then the Tenby rink moved very through the gears and in the second half they made short work of their opposition, putting them to the sword by winning 9 of the last 11 ends before finally posting a score of 28-11.

It was much the same story on rink 2 with ‘Wigan’s Warriors’. With Cloakey leading and G-Unit backing him up the rink was again off to a flyer and similarly to rink 1 they found themselves 9-3 up after 7 ends. What happened over the next couple of ends will truly by un-recordable, not for anything to do with the play but the score keeping by both skips. This year the powers that be have ordered that all skips must keep the card, now we have to remember that most skips have been playing back-end for donkeys years and haven’t kept score for that long too, leaving it up to the lowly seconds to sort out. Well this causes difficulty when one skip messes the card up, but when one contrives to lose the card and Mal Evans’ card turns out to be a better piece of fiction than anything Wilber Smith ever wrote then you get the feeling a few shots may have been missed out. Still with the noble assistance of Noel Thomas, Mal was eventually put right, scores agreed (sort of) and the game continued. Fortunately the delay affected the Pendine boys more than the Tenby lot and almost mirroring rink 1 they took 8 of the last 11 ends and ending up comfortable winners 33-14.

Rink 3 was a much more sedate affair and to be fair to the Pendine rink they could have snatched a victory as the match was all square at 10-all (“Who to?”) after 14 ends. But Craig Guymer and his fellow Welsh Junior trialist, Brother Luke and Luke Rees together with the next days County Pairs and Rinks winner Mike Jackson are a tried and tested combination, they kept their heads and picked up 14 shots to 1 over the last third, winning 24-11.  Unfortunately a certain Dave King- Thomas spoilt Tenby’s perfect evening. This match was one that Tenby should have really had in the bag. From the outset the rink skipped by John Roberts were in control and were 14-5 up at tea. But fair play to Dai and his rink they never gave up and battled to the last. With only four ends left to play the Tenby rink still held onto a 6 shot lead, but after dropping a three and two singles the Tenby rink held a precarious one shot lead going into the last end. Again all looked good for Tenby, holding shot as the skips came to bowl. With only a bowl each left for the two skips Tenby held on still by the narrowest of margins, but with his last wood of the game in came DKT to draw the shot for Pendine, a fantastic wood. Sadly John Roberts wasn’t quite able to reply in the manner he would have liked and so in the end the rink had to settle for the draw.

So the Blue Machine rolled on in the League, remaining undefeated and racking up a considerable shots average. This 13-1 win and 49 shots the league title remains firmly in our sights.