Warwickshire v Kent
Warwickshire rounded off their season in the premier division of the Riley’s BDO Inter County Championships with a home tie against Kent. Both teams were in a safe mid table position pride the only thing they had to play for.
In the Saturday ladies game twice the hosts took the lead against the darts, Lisa Whitmore (Warwickshire) getting the first win, a straight 3-0 success against Ann Wallis. Replying for Kent was Dany Ambrose, who won 3-1 in her game with Louise Graham. Edwina Holdsworth put Warwickshire’s noses in front again, a 3-1 win taking the score along to 2-1. As before the lead was cancelled out, this time it was Kent’s June Stacey who provided the win with her 3-0 result over Wendy Adams.
It was the penultimate game before the sequence was broken and doing just that was Jackie Holman, a close 3-2 verdict over Melanie Hill giving Kent the lead for the first time in the match. Keeping the best till last, Warwickshire’s Donna Pinch levelled the game for the third and final time when she beat Susan Bird 3-1, her 18.09 average taking the match award.
The men’s ‘B’ team finished on a high, a cracking 8-4 victory and that was after losing the first game. David (Warwickshire) opened up against Paul Wratton and went down 4-1, however Carl Green and Steve Giddings in turn had 4-0 and 4-1 wins against Craig Watkins and Peter Gallacher to give the home side a short lived lead of 2-1. Short lived as Steve Sidders (Kent) had a 4-2 win against Ian Shaw, but from there Warwickshire never really looked back. Robert Hawker, with a 28.82 man of the match average and a 4-2 scoreline defeated Ken McCarthy, then with a similar margin Mark Strong accounted for Phil Evans to go 4-2 up.
Sm Fuller’s 4-2 win over Jimmy Hill slightly reduced the deficit, Simon Power restoring the two games buffer with his 4-2 success against Jordan Dadd. Although Marc Lee clawed another back for Kent when he beat Paul Deslandes 4-2, the final three games all went to the hosts. Mark Archer, Matthew Edgar and Antony Allen took out their counterparts David Salter, Carl Wislon and John Dyke to give the points from the 8-4 win to Warwickshire.
After going down 2-0 when Julie Edwards and Sally Rose beat Angela Jones and Marian Conway, the ladies ‘A’ did well to come back to level terms with wins from Sue and Trina Gulliver, who in turn defeated Emma Little and Suzanne Campfield. Unfortunately the comeback didn’t last any longer than the two games as Stacey Dawkins and Donna Rainsley both won at the expense of Caroline Pike and Denise Burke to give Kent a 4-2 win.
What was needed from the men’s ‘A’ side now was , at the worst a 6-6 draw for an overall win and that most certainly looked on the cards when the first three players all won. First on was Mark Westgarth who won 4-2 against Barrie Knight, then came two 4-1 wins from Kevin Dowling and Nigel Heydon beating Steven Stacey and Nigel Payne. Heydon claiming the match award with his 28.43 average.
From 3-0 up to 4-3 down as Kent bounced back in style thanks to Clive Barden, Pater Mitchell, Steve Collins and Mark Pattison, the first three all winning 4-1 against respective opponents Tom Aldridge, Richard Foster, David Harris and Jamie Atkins.
Ian McFarlane restored parity when he accounted for Terry Dunford with a close 4-3 win, but as before Kent then won the next and final four games to clinch an 8-4 win and an overall 19-17 victory. Supplying the match winning games were Peter Allen, Pip Blackwell, Mick Norris and Paul Dawkins, with Tom McGlone, Mark Carter, Noel Grant and Steve Hine on the receiving end.
The result saw Warwickshire finish sixth with 173 points and Kent fourth with 182.