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Tenby Arches Ladies
TENBY ARCHES LADIES
May 2016
Last week was a busy week for the Arches Ladies, playing three consecutive league games on Wednesday afternoon and Thursday and Friday evenings. The first of these games was played at home against Pembroke Dock Ladies, and although it was competitive, it was played in a very friendly and jovial manner, with the Arches Ladies collecting four league points and Pembroke Dock two. The game did not start well for Arches captain Carol who skipped her rink of Margaret, Liz and Gerry. They dropped a count of four on the first end and never recovered against a strong Pembroke Dock rink skipped by Betty James, finally losing by 26 shots to 14. In complete contrast, the Arches' second rink skipped by Alison and supported by Meryl, Jan and Jo dominated their game, winning by 32 shots to nine. The final score was 46 shots to the Arches and 35 to the visitors.
Tenby Ladies' second game of the week was an evening fixture played at home against Whitland Ladies, which ended in a surprising result. Gerry skipped a changed rink of Meryl, Carol and Helen, who found themselves in a very tight game. At 10 ends, the Arches Ladies were one shot ahead, but sealed a win by picking up 10 shots on the following four ends, finally winning by 24 shots to 10. On the outside rink, skip Alison was supported by Lynn, Jan and Jo. Alison's rink raced away to a 14-shot lead after 10 ends and at 15 ends went further ahead by 20 shots to five and then the Whitland fightback began, picking up an incredible 16 shots without reply to lead by one shot with two ends to play. Alison's rink picked up one shot on the penultimate end to tie the scores and, with the light fading fast, it was down to a last end 'shoot out.' Club stalwart Lynn bowled the perfect lead shot, finishing on the jack, which was to remain unchallenged as Whitland tried desperately to move it. The result was a one shot win for Alison's rink by 22 shots to 21 and an overall win for the Arches Ladies by 46 shots to 31 and six league points.
On Friday night, the Arches Ladies travelled to Whitland, still buoyant from the previous evening's win, but this was to change once they took to the green. Whitland were revitalised and dominated this back-to-back clash, winning by 51 shots to 28. Alison's rink of Carol, Jan and Lynn were always playing catch-up and were never able to put pressure on the Whitland rink skipped by Cally, eventually losing by 29 shots to 14. Gerry's rink of Meryl, Liz and Jo had a much tighter game and at 10 ends were just one shot adrift, but a six on the 11th from the Whitland Ladies created a buffer which the Arches Ladies could not reduce, losing by 22 shots to 14. Whitland Ladies gained their revenge and secured the maximum six league points.
Tenby v Haverfordwest
Pembrokeshire League Division One
Tenby 82 (10 Points) v Haverfordwest 80 (4 Points).
30th April 2016
The Molson Coors sponsored Tenby Team continued their league programme against last years’ runners up, Haverfordwest BC. The game ended up after playing 83 out of 84 ends with Tenby a solitary shot in front and two down with only two bowls left to play (Craig Guymer). Craig made shot with an excellent shot which left Tenby with a two shot victory. This was a lucky escape for the Tenby team albeit against a strong Haverfordwest team who must be left shaking their heads after such a great performance. At five ends, the Haverfordwest team got off to a great start, leading by 9 shots. At ten ends, Tenby had reduced the lead by a single shot, Haverfordwest leading by 8 shots. At fifteen ends, Tenby clawed back a further four shots to trail by 4. Tenby then made further inroads by reducing the lead to a single shot. At the twenty end mark, Tenby took the lead and led by 3 shots. On the last end, Diment and Peregrine both dropped counts of two (4 shots), Muskett took a two and Guymer a single to mean a two shot win for Tenby.
Rink 1: Craig Guymer returned to action this week, skipping Ryan Thomas, club chairman Fred Broomhead and Mike Jackson. They played against Richard O’Leary, last years County President. Off to a quick start (as usual), the four led 5-1 after five ends which was extended to 14-6 after 10 ends. A comeback from the Haverfordwest rink in which they scored two counts of four shots, a double and a single to take the lead at the fifteen end mark, 14-18. Despite a count of three shots on the eighteenth end, the Haverfordwest foursome completed a very good win 19-24.
Rink 2: The ever dependable Muskett, Day and Lloyd combination were joined by Dai Rees to play against the County Team Manager, PDS Jenkins. Dropping a count of four shots on the first end certainly woke them up and they restricted their opponents to six more scoring ends, and they were all single shots. In turn the Muskett rink three counts of 3 shots, four counts of 2 shots and 6 singles, winning the match 24-10.
Rink 3: Kieran Peregrine, Chris Court, Joe Richards and Cameron White took on former Tenby player Alan Whitehouse. A high scoring start to the game with a count of 4 shots dropped on the first end and a count of 5 shots taken on the second end, followed by a dropped count of 3 shots on the third end…phew! A couple of singles to each foursome brought things back to normality for a brief moment before Tenby took a count of 4 shots only to drop a further two counts of 3 shots on the next two ends. Tenby took a double on the 9th end and promptly dropped a further 3 shots on the 10th (end). Score at ten ends 12-18. The defensive part of the match then really went ‘for a Burton’ with Tenby taking two counts of six shots on ends 14 and 19, finally winning an extremely high scoring game 29-25.
Rink 4: Paul Diment, John Roberts, Liam Price and Ben Cloake played against Gareth Barrett. This was the first time that the rink had played together and on paper this is a very strong rink. However, despite them only dropping one count of 3 shots and then all two’s and one’s – they could not curtail an excellent performance by the Haverfordwest rink. In fact, the Tenby rink only scored on six ends. A final score of 10-21.
Defensive Award: D Rees, A Lloyd, P Day and A Muskett
Offensive Award: C White, J Richards, C Court and K Peregrine
Shot of the Day: Craig Guymer’s match winning shot on the 21st end.
Pembroke Dock v Five Arches
Pembroke Dock 78 (2pts) Five Arches 92 (12pts)
30th April 2016
The start of a new season and no better place to be than Pembroke Dock in the sunshine. Last season Pembroke Dock won a closely fought match by seven shots and the Five Arches were looking forward to going one better this year. Five Arches new boys , Webby and Beano ably assisted by Five Arches veterans Ken and Johnno had a tough game against Pembroke Dock Captain Richard Jones and his rink. Evenly matched after 6 ends, the Pembroke Dock rink then exploded into action picking up 10 shots in 3 ends to lead 15 shots to 3. A fightback got the Arches to within 8 shots but the Dock boys edged the remaining ends to run out winners by 26 shots to 12. Simon and his rink of Roger, TP and Steve carried on where they left off in their previous match cruising to another comfortable win. Leading by 8 shots to nil after 3 ends, they stretched this out to 22 shots to 11 after 15 ends and eased to 27 shots to 16 victory.
Ashley and his rink of Dai, Dave and debutant Viv had a ding dong battle against Brian Dowling's quartet. Leading by 11 shots to 3 after 9 ends, they dozed off after the tea interval to be 19 shots to 15 behind after 16 ends. However a fine finish led to a narrow 24 shots to 21 win. On rink 4, we welcomed back Gerald, who together with his rink of John, Kev and Neil produced a commanding performance. They led by 14 shots to 3 after 6 ends including two counts of 5 shots, picking up two further counts of 4 increased their lead to 27 shots to 10 after 15 ends and comfortably ran out winners by 29 shots to 15 at the end of the match. A great start to the Five Arches season, picking up 12 points away from home. The Carruthers qualifying matches now occupy the next three weeks of the season, with the next Five Arches game , away to Milford on the 28th May.
Ken Lloyd, Jon Hubbard, Huw Nicholas, Jon Webb 12 R Jones 26
Roger Thomas, Tony Powling, Steve Davies, Simon Evans 27 M John 16
Viv John, David Lloyd, Dai Spencer, Ashley Hooper 24 B Dowling 21
John Rees, Kevin Lewis, Neil Dickinson, Gerald Hewitt 29 R Thomas 15
Tenby Arches Ladies v Pembroke Dock Park
Tenby Arches Ladies started their season last week with back to back wins against Pembroke Dock Park Ladies. The first of these games was played away in warm, pleasant conditions. Both Tenby rinks started poorly, finding it difficult to get the length and pace of the green.
Alison’s rink of Carol, Jan and Lynn failed to score on the first three ends, but gradually found their form, winning comfortably by 29 shots to 9, including a run of 10 consecutive ends picking up 20 shots. On the outside rink, Gerry was supported by Meryl, Liz and Jo Shrewry, who has joined the Arches Ladies from neighbours Whitland. This Arches rink were up against a Park triple who started and finished well, with Tenby Ladies picking up shots at the midway stage, but eventually lost by 14 shots to 22.5. The overall score was Tenby Arches 43 shots Pembroke Dock Park 31.5, with four league points going to Tenby and two to Pembroke Dock.
In contrast to Tuesday’s game, the Friday rematch was played in continuous rain. This was not the weather to play bowls in, but the green was playable, so the ladies donned their wet weather clothing and got on with the rematch. There were no changes to Alison’s rink, with Carol, Jan and Lynn in support. With the game shortened to 18 ends, Alison’s ladies won comfortably over a Pembroke Dock Park triples by 20 shots to 7.5. Gerry, once again on an outside rink, had a much closer game than the score suggests, losing by 12 shots to 19. They had their chances, but were thwarted by shot-saving bowls from the Park skip. The overall score was Tenby Arches Ladies 32 shots Pembroke Dock Park 26.5, with four league points to Tenby and two points for the Park.
This was a steady start to the 2016 season, securing eight points out of maximum 12.
Milford Haven v Tenby
Milford Haven 55 (2 Points) Tenby 84.75 (12 Points)
23rd April 2016
The start of the new season is already upon us and maybe its my age that makes it seem like yesterday that we were in Pembroke Dock playing our last league game of the 2015 season. 2015 witnessed Tenby beat the Pembrokeshire record of 7 consecutive league titles by making it 8 in a row under the Captaincy of Joe Richards. Least we forget that Tenby also lost in the final of the Carruthers Shield. Therefore, with the exception of winning the league again and winning the Carruthers Shield, the team / club cannot exceed last years’ achievements. Unfortunately, the team had only 13 players from their squad of 22 but under the rules, could still field a side without having to incur a penalty of 6 points.
Rink 1. The first triples combined Mike Jackson and John Roberts aided by current County Pairs Winner and Under 25 International squad member Liam Price who has joined the club from Whitland. They were pitted against Lee Power, an excellent young player who has recently returned to play for the Milford Club. John’s team raced off with three 2’s, but then dropped a sequence of 3, 4, 3 to trail at six ends (6-10). However, such an experienced triple was always likely to respond and that they did by winning seven of the next eight ends by a score of 11 shots to 1. At fifteen ends, the score was in favour of Tenby by 19-12. A late rally by Lee Power’s rink saw them lose the game 21-18 but with the 25% deduction for fielding three players, Tenby lost the game, 15.75 to 18.
Rink 2. The formidable trio of Aaron Lloyd, Peter Day and Andrew Muskett were matched against the returning former County Skip, Ernie Sturley. To be fair to the Milford Haven rink, I would not have liked to play against these three, so comfortable and in tune with each other they are. Racing off to an 8-2 lead after 5 ends, the onslaught began in earnest with the Tenby rink outscoring the Milford rink by 8-1 over the next 5 ends to lead 16-3. The following 5 ends, saw a return of 10-1 (26-4) and the final six ends saw the Milford rink finish with honours even 5-5. Therefore, a final score of 31-9. However, 25% would be deducted from the Tenby team due to them playing with three players, but a win assured despite the penalty.
Rink 3. The final triple of the hero of RTB Ebbw Vale match last year, Kieran Peregrine together with new partners of Chris Court and Cameron White played against Roy Thomas who played with a very strong rink of which comprised the returning Jim Carter and Dave Buchannan. A bad start saw the triple fall behind by 1-7. However, a recovery over the next five ends saw them take the lead, 9-8. This lead was extended by 2 shots over the next five ends (15-13) despite dropping a count of four shots on the 15th end. The Milford rink seemed to be looking strong to claim the 2 points (considering the 25% deduction for playing three players) when, on the 20th end, Kieran played a great bowl to make a count of 8 shots to extend his lead by 10 shots. The win was confirmed on the last end by taking a further count of 4 shots. Final score was 29-15.
Rink 4.The new Tenby Captain, Paul Diment played with Junior International and last years Captain, Joe Richards together with Dai Rees and Fred Broomhead. They played against the experienced Tony Ellyatt. In similar vein to the Andrew Muskett team, the rink took control early in the game and at five ends, led 8-3 which was increased at ten ends (15-5) and then at fifteen ends (19-8). Once again, identical to the Andrew Muskett score, the rink drew the final six ends, five a piece meaning a winning score of 24-13.
Conclusion:
I have always held the opinion that if you restrict the opposition to counts of 1’s and2’s, then you will always stand a great chance of winning individual rinks. Therefore, upon analysis the following facts are interesting. Kieran conceded a 3 and 4 whilst taking two counts of 4 shots a three and an eight. John Roberts conceded three counts of 3 and a count of 4. In return, John took two counts of ‘3’. Andrew Muskett dropped one count of 3 shots whilst taking a count of 3 and 4 in return. Paul Diment did not drop any counts over 2 shots and looking at his offence, took a count of 3 and 4.Therefore this week’s awards are:
Best Defensive display: (Paul Diment, Joe Richards, Fred Broomhead and Dai Rees)
Best offensive performance: (Cameron White, Chris Court and Kieran Peregrine)
Shot of the Day: Kieran Peregrine (making a count of eight shots)
This was a very good start against a strong Milford Haven team despite having 3 players short. Many teams will struggle against the Milford team and they seem to be a team once again to be feared. Tenby play against Haverfordwest at home tomorrow and once again a strong performance will be required.