Isle of Man County Crown Green Bowling Association

Peel Bowling Club hosted the Davison’s sponsored Autumn Shield on Saturday attracting an strong entry of 68. All players were off a handicap of +6 in order to get through the field in good time.

Losing out in the quarter finals were Steve Parker (Onchan) who had his challenge ended by Marown’s Neil Withers 15-21, whilst Reg Temporaza (Onchan) battled well before losing out to home greener Andy Kennish 17-21. Colin Kelly (Marown) had enough to see off his son Tom Kelly (Peel) with a 21-17 win, whilst Alan Moore (South Ramsey) beat Jimmy Sansom (Douglas) 21-10.

In the semi-final Withers seen off Saturday’s winner Andy Kennish with a 21-13 win, whilst Moore did enough to take his place in the final with a hard earned 21-17 victory over Colin Kelly.

The final started with both players having played the edges well all day, with Alan taking the early initiative to go 10-6 ahead playing his favoured edge, whilst Withers went for a change of tactic from earlier rounds when he scored his first point with a front toucher to then head for the crown playing over the middle of the green to level things up at 10-10. Moore then scored two quick fire doubles to lead 14-10, with Withers taking a single to prevent Moore getting a run in the corners. On the next end Withers was lying one, only for Moore to play a front toucher to lead 15-11. A poor couple of ends in the next four ends from Moore allowed Withers to score four doubles to go 19-15 ahead. On the next end Withers left enough room for Moore to bowl in, which he took the opportunity to do so to score a single. At 16-19 Moore once again headed for his favoured edge and scored five consecutive singles, playing some great second bowls to save him on four of the five ends to go 20-19 ahead. On the next end Moore played another great second bowl to count for game forcing Withers to strike. Withers connected with his strike moving two of the bowls and the jack was rolling off the green only for it to hit the metal edging and roll back. Fortunately after watching the live streaming back this was able to conclusively prove it did hit the metal to keep the jack on the green, therefore it ended up a dead end. Both players quickly regained their focus with Moore putting up a lead less than a foot short, and Withers putting one level with the jack. Moore connected with his first bowl, however it only rocked and fell back with Withers winning a tight measure to level things up at 20-20. Withers led a fair lead with an 18 inch bowl, which Moore bettered with a bowl nine inches to the side of the jack, forcing Withers to play through again, however he missed which allowed Moore to breathe a huge sigh of relief to claim a 21-20 victory. This was Moore’s second singles open win with his previous victory being the Dreswick Cup in 2012.

The presentation was made by Peel President Dougie Allan who thanked Davison’s for the generous sponsorship, the club members for assisting throughout the day, along with competition secretary Dave ‘Barney’ Kelly for organising and running the competition. Ian Davison of sponsors Davison’s was then introduced to present the prizes and confirmed that sponsorship of the competition had been agreed for a further five years.