Black Country’s second fixture in the L-Style Division One of the UKDA National League was an away tie with Berkshire, prior to the game Black Country were lying eighth in the division with twenty-seven points from just one game and their opponents seventh on twenty-eight points from two games.
Kicking off the proceedings were the ladies ‘B’ and it was the home team that had the better start as Chris Ruffell and Nipaporn Smith put them two up with respective 3-0 and 3-1 wins against Stella Sims and Amy-Leigh Tolley. It took a lady of the match performance from Sarah-Jane Parker to stop the rot as she reduced the arrears to 2-1 with her straight 3-0 win over Tracey Kingston and 15.66 average. A further 3-0 win for Paige Robbins over Angela Hogan levelled the score before Berkshire forged ahead again in the fifth when Tania Burdett beat Lacey Hughes 3-0 and with a 3-2 win for Carole Holroyd against Kirsty Shaughnessy in the last game Berkshire were the 4-2 winners.
The men’s ‘B’ began with a man of the match win for Dave Edwards (Black Country) who handed his opponent Ryan Priestly a 4-0 whitewash and averaged 25.69. Despite such a promising start it was Berkshire who then took the lead as Glen Brown and James Clifton in turn won 4-1 against John Green and Neil Steventon. A close 4-3 win for Mark Jones over Ian Hobbs levelled the game at 2-2 before Black Country took the lead for a second time, this time thanks to Mark Rollinson who won 4-1 against Robert Carr. By the halfway point the away side had opened up a 4-2 lead as Kieron Bridgwater added his 4-0 success over Lewis Doe to their tally.
Black Country’s lead was extended to 6-2 as the second half got underway, Wayne Hobday winning 4-3 against Ashley Upson and Ian Townsend beating Doug Harwood 4-1. Berkshire got their third stripe on the board in the ninth when Jesse Goddard won 4-3 against Rob Smith but that was to be their last winner as Sam Bissell beat Alex Ball 4-1, Rich Bowen won 4-2 against Steven Hobbs and rounding off a 9-3 victory for Black Country was Al Smith who had a 4-3 win over Ryan Newton.
The first four games of the ladies ‘A’ match all went with the first throw advantage with Black Country twice taking the lead first through Chez Allcock, who took the lady of the match award for her 20.88 average and 3-0 win over Karen Jackson and then thanks to Doreen Hunt who had a 3-1 success against Vanessa O’Connell. Wiping out the away team’s leads were Ally Judge with her 3-2 win against Tammy Chance and Kelly Ellis whose 3-0 win over Abbey Hunt restored parity at 2-2. The penultimate encounter saw the sequence break when Berkshire’s Debbie Shadwell accounted for Kirsty Shaughnessy with a 3-0 result only to see the game levelled at 3-3 when Heather Wright won the final game against Hayley Watts 3-2.
With the running score standing at 14-10 in Black Country’s favour just five winners were all that were required to secure an overall victory for the weekend and four of those were secured in the first half. Paul Wells and Tom Bissell opened up a 2-0 lead for the away side when Wells won 4-3 against James Shaw and Bissell beat Paul Hogan 4-2. Anthony Dean pulled one back for the hosts when he won 4-1 against Trev Brennan but Black Country’s two games buffer was restored in the fourth when Jamie Barrowman beat James Wiggins 4-1. Terry Stubbs was Berkshire’s second winner as he added a 4-2 win over George Willetts to their account but at the midway point it was the visitors who were leading 4-2 after Steve Jones closed the half with a 4-1 success over Paul Holloway.
The overall win was achieved as early as the seventh game, Jamie Rollinson getting the second session underway with a 4-1 win over Jack Mayoh. It was a this point that the home team had their best run of the match as they went from 5-2 down to lead 6-5 with wins from Richard Stride, Karl Williams, Joe Lacey and Stephen Wood who in turn defeated Alex Howells (4-3), Michael Powell (4-1), Dan Homer (4-1) and Martin Greenwood (4-2). The last game of the day and weekend went the full seven legs distance with Black Country’s Liam Kelly taking the man of the match award for his 4-3 win over Peter Bisset and 27.56 average, putting the final score for the game at 6-6.
The overall 20-16 victory for Black Country saw them replace their hosts in seventh place with fifty points, six more than Berkshire who slipped to eighth. Although twenty-four points short of leaders Middlesex, Black Country are only ten points behind second placed Clwyd and they have a game in hand on all of the teams above them apart from third placed Merseyside who like Black Country have only played two games.
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