2011 Summer Hong Kong Pairs – Report by Dave Jenkins: CALB Chairman

 The Semi-final and finals of the above competition were played on a most glorious day on Sunday the 26.06.11 at Indalo LBC.

The semi-finalists were from the Almeria LBC and the Indalo LBC

In the first semi-final Cath and Alan Eedle from the Indalo LBC who had topped group A – played Ann Tuplin and Terry Rodgers from Indalo LBC who had topped group B

Ann was substituting for Jim Pike who had to return to the UK.

Unfortunately Cath and Alan never recovered after a bad start losing a 6 on the 3^rd end and only opening their account when Ann and Terry already had 12 shots on the board. After this the game became very even and the final score showed this as it was the 12 shot difference which held throughout the game and the final score was 21-9. Cath and Alan called it a day after the 17^th end. Well done to them perhaps they lacked a little experience in some of their shot selection.

In the 2^nd semi-final Les Pratchett and John Compton from Almeria LBC who were the best runners-up from group C played Colin Rowling and Alan Terry from Almeria LBC who topped group C

It was not Colin’s and Alan’s day, they were under pressure from the start Les and John were bowling extremely well. And after making a spirited fight of it for the first 11 ends when the score was 12-9 to Les and John.

Colin and Alan lost 16 shots in the last 5 ends and had to concede with the score at 28-11 after the 16^th ends.

The final between Les and John and Ann and Terry was a very close encounter. It looked in the beginning Les and John were going to continue where they had left off in the semi-final taking a 7-3 lead after 9 ends but Ann and Terry dug in and got the score back to 7-7, then took the lead 9-7,  back came Les and John taking a 4 on the next end to lead again 11-9 after the 13^th end, only to lose a 3 on the 14th end. With 4 ends to play Les and John were 1 shot down. They made 1 shot on the 15^th end, so the scores were level. Ann and Terry gained a 2 and a 1 on the 16^th and 17^th ends. They went into the last end 3 shots down, John drew shot,  Ann had 2^nd bowl. John instructed Les to bowl his woods behind the jack which he did; John’s intentions were to trail the jack to Les’s group of woods. He struck the jack unfortunately it went back to Ann’s wood which had also been put behind as insurance so Ann and Terry ran out the winners 16-12. What a good final with experience showing though on both sides well worth watching.

Dave Jenkins Chairman of the CALB Committee presented the trophy to Ann and Terry and congratulated the semi-finalists and the finalists for a very enjoyable days bowling. He thanked all the bowlers who had entered the event He also thanked the Indalo LBC for the use of their facilities and John Dando who umpired the event. He gave a special thanks to Brian Saunders the CALB administrator for all the frustrating work he did to keep the league tables through the group stages up to date and thus producing the semi-finalists for today’s event