Late Comebacks

Apologies first of all for the lack of a report last week – it’s amazing how a house move can disrupt the schedule, even for the most important things in life! But at least there is more than usual in this week’s report.

The Round-of-16 matches in the Euro football finals saw a couple of late comebacks (Switzerland’s last-minute equaliser against France, and Ukraine’s last-kick winner against Sweden spring to mind). Our teams also kept the best till last in several games this week, but before looking at those we should catch up on the ladies’ game against Morpeth (23 June).

The previous league match had ended in a one-shot defeat after a close encounter, and this one also proved to be tight. Susan’s rink did well to stack up an eleven-shot win as twelve of the 18 ends were decided by singles; but by winning 13 ends and securing almost all the multiple scores our team won 18-7. Shelagh’s rink got off to a slow start but managed to recover from 2-10 to 8-10 over a run of four ends; that was the one purple patch, however, and the final result was 10-16. It was a similar story for Betty, also winning seven ends and with the obvious damage done in losing five ends on the trot to go from 3-3 after five to 3-12 after ten. That basic margin remained, and with a 8-16 score we found we had lost overall by 36-39 on shots. The three rinks were all relatively low-scoring, with similar numbers – total shots on each rink were 24, 25 and 26 – and the number of ends won was equal at 27 per team. But however close it might have been in these statistical terms the sad fact remained that it was a 2-12 defeat on league points.

Later the same day the men welcomed Rockcliffe in the Clegg league, hoping to recover after two defeats. Keith Woods’ result was never in doubt, 15 shots up after 15 ends and easy 27-15 winners; John Lambert was also able to control the game in the final ends, finishing at 25-13, while Mark was not only well-placed after 15 ends (18-10) but finished with an extra flourish to win 31-10. The overall result was clearly settled at this stage, but Keith Sanders’ rink, last to finish, had the chance to make it a clean sweep. Things hadn’t looked promising early on and at the half-way mark it was 4-12. This had come back to 11-14 after fifteen ends and 15-15 with two ends to play. In the twentieth end the shot bowl changed at least four times, but Rockcliffe won it so that, going into the last, it was 15-16. With the skips to play Rockcliffe were lying one, but Keith drew the shot before the Rockcliffe skip, with his last bowl, turned one of ours in to make it two shots to us, so that Keith (to the relief of a sizeable audience!) chose not to bowl his last wood. The 17-16 win made it 14-0 on league points and also made it 100 shots in total for ourselves on the night – scoring a ton is quite a rarity in this league.

There was not much chance of repeating that feat at Westerhope this week, not least because they were top of the league. The green looked to be in lovely condition, but turned out to be astonishingly slow – it was very “pushy”, more remininscent of April than the last day of June. Adjustments of pace were very tricky, and of course home advantage, with knowledge of such conditions, was important.

All the better, then, that we managed to keep heads above water. Trevor’s rink held their own early on, though it was always close, and after eleven ends the score was 8-4. The home team’s use of long ends then took its toll, and the final result was 15-22. Mark repeated the late act of the previous week, moving from 12-8 after fifteen ends to 23-9 after the full 21; and Keith Woods also moved well ahead, from 9-3 after ten ends to 19-4 after fifteen, and maintaining that margin to the end (26-11). Not to be outdone, Keith Sanders managed a reprise of the Rockcliffe finale, slipping from 10-4 to 12-16 after 15 ends, then going into the last end at 19-19. It looked to be a measure until Keith slipped a forehand through an unlikely gap to clinch the shot and another two league points for a 12-2 league win and (pending other results) a brief spell at the top of the table. Two excellent results, anyway.

Sandwiched somewhere between them was a drab, dreich night at Haltwhistle, where it rained throughout last week’s West Tyne match and we came away empty-handed as well as wet. It wasn’t all bad: Mark’s rink lost by only one shot, while Brian Elstob’s trio led 12-7 after 13 ends – but then lost the last five by a margin of 1-12. Keith Sanders had a good enough opening, but going from 6-7 to 6-16 was a crucial run. And – apart from the friendliness of the hosts – that is probably all we should say about a difficult night.

This week’s West Tyne match was at home against Hexham House A(bbey). Trevor’s rink was up against what was clearly the strongest House rink, so it was really not the night for him to turn in a poor performance – even more erratic than the previous night at Westerhope, where at least the green was a mitigating factor. The score here mounted alarmingly in favour of the visitors, reaching 9-26 towards the end. But our other rinks had done much better, and with Mark’s men scoring a seven on one end it turned out that after 15 ends there was only one shot in it overall: 38-37 in our favour. At this point, not only did Keith Sanders and Mark continue their excellent run to finish 23-5 and 20-10 up respectively, but having something to play for seemed to galvanise Trevor’s rink, who won the last three ends, scoring ten shots in the process. Indeed, the last three ends on the three rinks finished 22-2 in our favour, so that we not only won two rinks but also claimed the bonus points with a 60-39 win. It really was a strong finish, and no doubt a major surprise to those spectators who left early. They thought it was all over…