Bad day all round for Wirral bowlers (From Wirral Globe)

Bad day all round for Wirral bowlers

1:18pm Tuesday 17th July 2012 in Bowls By Bill Atkinson

WITH both teams losing, Sunday was not a good day for Wirral's two Parks teams, though the Birkenhead and District team got agonisingly close with 11 individual winners.

In the home match at Heswall Birkenhead won by 232 to 202 points winning eight of the 12 jacks; the in-form John Finch was the pick of the bunch recording a 21-07 win.

Unfortunately, the away team could only manage three winners, the best being Steve Harrison with a 21-17, and they lost 236-171.

This resulted in an overall win of 17-14 in favour of the team from North Staffs.

The Wallasey Association team, playing on the lower green at the New Brighton Cricket and Bowls Club, also had a home win, in this case 224-191, with seven winners.

Dave Gilmore was in great form winning very comfortably 21-07.

However, the away team playing in Stretford, Greater Manchester, only won one of their games, a 21-17 for Karl Sherbrooke, and they went down by 248-175 points; this meant that the team from Greater Manchester won 21-10.

The Birkenhead and District Parks Merit Tournament took place at Heswall on Saturday and resulted in a win for Gladstone's John Finch - what a season he is having.

In the quarter-finals and the semis- Finch had to beat two of his team mates, Liam Ryan and Nick Burridge, before he got the better of Heswall RBL's Mal Andrews in the final.

Results: Quarter-finals: G Ellison 21, J Whalley 18; M Andrews 21, N Hughes 20; J Finch 21, L Ryan 15; N Burridge 21, I Hazlehurst 13. Semi-finals: Andrews 21, Ellison 15; Finch 21, Burridge 10.

Final: Finch 21, Andrews 17.

Normally, all the semi-finalists would go on to represent Birkenhead and District in the park senior tournament later this season but John Finch has already qualified for the finals of the Richmond Tournament on the same day. The other three semi-finalists and one other player will now go forward.

In the Bebington League's 'A' Division two teams, Lever 'A' and Gladstone, have opened up a big lead. On Thursday, Lever 'A' defeated Gladstone by 26 shots in their home game and it now looks as though the return match at Gladstone on August 7 will be the championship decider.

On the same night in the Wallasey Association's first division, West Kirby Victoria took a big step towards retaining their title when they narrowly defeated close rivals Queens Royal on the green at West Kirby.

During this week the qualifying rounds of the Birkenhead and Wirral's afternoon section Ben Webster Tournament will be played on greens throughout Wirral.

The final will be at Tixalls on Friday, with a 1.30pm start. It can only be hoped that the rain which has so affected this season and completely wiped out Friday's Birkenhead League games does not affect this tournament.