2012-01-01

Since last going to print West Midlands have played two further division one fixtures in the BDO Inter County Championships, the first of the two games was an away tie against Gwent. It was not a good weekend for the ladies as both sides finished on the wrong side of 5-1 results. The ‘B’ team began with promise as Jacqui Simmons beat her counterpart, Sarah Adams in three straight legs with a 14.31 average, which at the end of the day earned her the lady of the match award. Unfortunately from there on in it was all the home team, but having said that three of the remaining five games went to a deciding leg.
Gail Johnson was Gwent’s first winner, a 3-2 success against Kim Fellows. There were then two 3-1 wins in a row from Natalie Tucker and Elaine Powell, who in turn defeated Shellbie Simmons and Tammy Chance. The last two games saw Gwent’s Sue Bailey and Hannah Price taken to the wire by Doreen Kaye and Jacqueline Maiden, but it was the home players who got the verdict to give their team a 5-1 win.
In the ‘A’ team game it was Gwent who got the first win, the match turning completely around from the ‘B’ game as the West Midlands on this occasion only won the final game as opposed from the first the previous day.
Amanda Rossa opened the home side’s account with a 3-1 win over Diane Tolley. Linda Rogers-Pickett and Moe Collier added their 3-2 wins over Jacqui Simons and Claire Hobbs to take the running score to 3-0 in the home teams favour. Another two 3-1 victories from Chris Savvery and Jan Robbins, at the expense of Heather Wright and Samantha Maiden gave the Gwent outfit a clear 5-0 lead, West Midlands gaining a consolation win in the last game when Jackie Crew (17.25) beat Michelle Shepperd 3-1.
It may not have been a good weekend for the ladies but the men certainly more than made up for their losses. The ‘B’ team could not have anticipated a better start as they stormed into a commanding and unassailable 7-0 lead. Paul Price got the show on the road with his 3-2 win over Steve Swallow, a 3-0 success from Dough Thompson against Russell Fletcher taking the score along to 2-0.
A man of the match 3-1 win from Mark Watkiss (26.59) against Sam Cankett, plus a 3-2 victory by Ian Stanton over Rhys Jenkins doubled the West Midlands lead to 4-0 and with two further 3-1 wins from Lance Hackett and Avatar Singh, after only six games West Midlands had guaranteed themselves of at the worst a share of the spoils.
As early as the seventh game victory was assured, Greg Parkes adding the vital seventh win when he defeated Dave Bevan 3-2. The following game saw the hosts chalk up their first winner of the day, Lyndon Gore’s 3-1 win over Martin Angell providing a little encouragement for the home crowd. The cheers were short lived as Jason Kesterton accounted for Rhys Powell with a 3-2 win, but the home side bounced back again with their second winner, Paul Mason, who despite being taken the full five legs distance by Viv Gould came out on top and added his win to the tally to make the running score 8-2 to the away team.
Two to play and both went to the Midlands side, Chris Stanley had a straight 3-0 win over Kevin Mills and John Platt came out the winner of a five legs affair with Craig Gilchrist to put the final score at 10-2 to the visitors.
The ‘A’ game was not as clear cut as the ‘B’ with the majority of the match seeing West Midlands opening up a two games lead only to see it cancelled out by their opponents.
Andy Forrester (West Midlands) won the opening game against Martyn Freeman 4-3 before Dean Stewart laid on a man of the match display against Mark Beynon. Dean kicked off with a 17 darts leg, followed that with18 and rounded off his 4-0 win with two super 16 darts legs giving him a 29.91 average.
The next two games went to Gwent’s Peter Johns and Carl Lloyd, both players winning in turn 4-1 against Jamie Hughes and Neil Pointon to level the score. West Midlands restored their two games buffer thanks to Peter Wyse, who beat Stephen Cake 4-3 and Ian Jones who, with a 4-2 scoreline accounted for Jesse Heal.
Gwent came back into the game with a Christopher Jones 4-0 win over Mark Watkiss and a 4-1 success by Adrian Rees against Richard Platt. With the score all level at 4-4 Matt Dicken (West Midlands) took on, and beat Phillip Evans 4-2 then with a 4-1 win by Jake Jones over Steve Challenger the West Midlands had for the third time in the match opened a two games lead. The running score now standing at 6-4 and with two to play, the sequence of the match was broken. Danny Coyle was taken all the way by Clifford Bull but it was the Midlands man who got the 4-3 result to register the all important seventh and winning game. The last game of the day between Paul Coslett (Gwent) and Nick Fulwell was a 4-1 for the former to put the final score at 7=5 to the West Midlands and an overall victory of 19-17.
The second fixture was a home tie against Cornwall, sadly home advantage proved not to be a factor in the outcome as the results from both Saturday and Sunday were exactly the same, the men losing 7-5 and the ladies losing 4-2. After Tammy Chance had lost the opener against Becky Curnow 3-0, Kath Jenkins (20.88) replied by beating Carla Ruberry by the same margin and win the lady of the match at the same time. West Midlands ladies ‘B’ went ahead for the first time when Samantha Maiden added her 3-2 win over Tracey Hancock to the tally, but the narrow 2-1 lead was short lived as Jane Cummings beat Jacqueline Maiden 3-0 and the Cornish lead was restored when a 3-2 win from Tyrian Jesse over Shellbie Simmons was added to the total. At down the home team still had everything to play for, however it was the guests who got the 4-2 result when Anna Johnson, after trailing 1-0 to Doreen Kaye fought back to win 3-1.
The men’s ‘B’ got off to a good start. Although they went one down when Wayne Newman won the first game against Mark Watkiss 3-1, they quickly recovered and rattled off five successive wins and it appeared as though they were strolling to their third victory in four fixtures. Providing the wins were Avtar Singh, Jason Kesterton, Jonathon Platt, Greg Parkes and Ian Stanton, with the losers for Cornwall being Neil Meneer, Malcolm Johns, Simon McClary, Brian Jones and Terry Webber.
At 5-1 up two from the last six games looked a good bet, it was not to be as there were to be no more winners for the West Midlands. Viv Gould lost 3-2 to Robert Ruberry, Doug Thompson went down 3-1 against Ian Packenas, there was a 3-0 defeat for Lance Hackett against Daniel May and 3-1 reversals for both Chris Stanley and Paul Price, who in turn played Geoff Jenkin and Anthony Teal. So from 5-1 up to 6-5 down with one to play and on the oche for the home team was Louis Burley and for Cornwall Shaun Burden. Burley won the first leg in 22 darts Burden took the following two in 32 and 20 darts. With a 26 darts leg Burley levelled the game in the fourth but then lost the decider to a 25 darts winning leg by Burden to give Cornwall a 7-5 win.
Taking the match award for the West Midlands was Ian Stanton, who in his game with Terry Webber won 3-2, after Webber had recorded outshots of 100 and 113. Stanton’s average was 26.51.
In Sunday’s ladies match Lisa Astbury opened up and set the ball rolling with a fine 3-1 win over Sandra Allen, only to see Sarah Gill (Cornwall) cancel out her win with a 3-2 success over Heather Wright. West Midlands went 2-1 down when Mandy Prout beat Jacqui Simmons 3-1, but were quickly back on terms when Kath Jenkins won a five legs encounter with Teresa Brookshaw 3-2. Kath chalked up a 16.79 average which for the second consecutive day earned her the lady of the match award.
The final two games went to Cornwall, Sue Shepherd won 3-1 against Jackie Crew and Nicola Furse’s 3-0win over Claire Hobbs gave the visitors their second 4-2 ladies win of the weekend.
Prior to the Cornwall fixture the West Midlands men’s ‘A’ were unbeaten, three wins in as many games, that was about to change. After Nick Fulwell (West Midlands) lost the first game to Michael Jones 4-1, Mark Rollinson restored parity with a 4-2 success against Kevin Bray. Then the away side stepped up a gear. William Mann and Adrian Lamerton had 4-3 wins over Peter Wyse and Neil Pointon, Sean Johns and Simon May both won 4-2, with Jake Jones and Jamie Hughes on the receiving end, taking the score along to 5-1 for Cornwall.
Stalwart Ian Jones, as always the man to produce a win whenever it’s most needed, turned on a man of the match display against Simon Knowles. Knowles won the first Jones the second, then the West Midlands man started to turn the screw by winning the third in 16 darts and with a maximum the fourth in 15. Despite a further maximum in the fifth he lost the leg in 15 darts as Knowles checked out in 12 hitting 100, 60, 140 and 45 then recording a 156 game shot. Nevertheless Jones kept his nerve and began the sixth leg with a maximum, his third in the last three legs and with follow up scores of 60, 100, 137 and 24 checked out on 24 for a winning 14 darts leg. His 3-2 win averaged at 29.11.
Inspired by Jones Performance Dean Stewart added to the home teams tally when he won a seven legs thriller against Darryl Baker 4-3 reducing the deficit to 5-3.
West Midlands lost the fight in the tenth game when wins from Paul Cook and Simon Stevenson over Richard Platt and Matt Dick took the score to 7-3 to Cornwall, an unassailable lead with only two remaining games. In the penultimate game Danny Coyle increased the host’s wins to five when he came from 1-0 down to Andrew Dunstan to win 4-2 and making the result a little more respectable was Andrew Forrester who beat Matthew Knowles in four straight game to put the final score at 7-5 to Cornwall and an overall win for them of 22-14.
The defeat has seen West Midlands drop two places in the division one promotion table to seventh, 18 points behind leaders Cornwall and 12 adrift of second placed Devon and of the five remaining fixtures only two of them are home games, could be a tough second half of the season.