Cup final defeat - but Braidmen back in pole position in league title race

Ballymena 85, Pickie 64: On Tuesday night Ballymena Seniors entertained Pickie and they claimed victory by a margin of 19 shots to keep their league aspirations alive.

On rink 1 James Gaston, Graham Wilson, Steven Falls and Nigel Robinson made steady but slow progress against R Irwin and went on to win 22-11.

J R Nicholl, J J Robinson, Alistair Coleman and Steven Coleman have been involved in some very close finishes recently and there was another one as they edged out P Campbell 21-20.

Andrew Bonnar, Jimmy Hodges, Andy Duncan and Jim Baker were in dominant form against N Belch, eventually winning by 28 shots to 9.

Steven Shields, Sammy Allen, Andrew Morrison and Andy Duncan fell to a 24-14 defeat on the other rink.

Ballymena 73, Belmont 71: After Tuesday night’s win against Pickie the Ballymena men led the NIPGL Senior League by 5 points. Belmont were in second place however they had a game in hand so this match was a match that neither could afford to lose.

This was a brilliant game and the outcome went down to the final bowl with the Ballymena men claiming 5 of the 7 points on offer to give them the advantage in the race for the title.

James Gaston, Graham Wilson, Steven Falls and Nigel Robinson opened up an early 7 shot lead against D Hamilton but found themselves two shots down with two ends to play. The Braid men however finished strongly and scores of 3 and 4 over the final 2 ends gave them a vital 21-16 victory.

JR Nicholl, Mark Torrington, Alistair Coleman and Steven Coleman were involved in a nip-and-tuck encounter with R Battersby with the lead changing on several occasions and it was no surprise that the game ended in an 18-18 draw.

Steven Shields, Sammy Allen, Andrew Morrison and Andrew Kyle made a horrendous start against S Bennett and were 17-3 down after 10 ends. The Ballymena rink fought back and they outscored the Belmont rink by 15 shots to 4 over the remaining ends to cut the arrears to only 3 shots. This was a great effort from the Ballymena men and in the context of the game this was a good result with the final score 21-18 in favour of Belmont.

Andrew Bonnar, Jimmy Hodges, Andrew Duncan and Jim Baker were involved in an incredible finish in their game against R Horner. With one end left, Belmont held an overall lead of 2 shots and looked to be on track to claim 5.5 points. With the shot in favour of the Belmont rink the young Ballymena third ditched the jack to leave the Braid men lying 3 shots and when the Belmont skip was unable to change the situation, Baker drew a 4th shot which gave his rink half a point and ensure an overall Ballymena victory by 2 shots.

PGL CUP

Ballymena 69, Belmont 78: On Thursday night the top two teams in the NIPGL travelled to Ulster Transport to contest the final of the NIPGL Senior Cup. Steven Shields, Sammy Allen, Andrew Morrison and Andrew Kyle were on fire on rink 1 against R Battersby, winning 30-9.

James Gaston, Graham Wilson, Steven Falls and Nigel Robinson won the last four ends beat R Horner 23-15.

J R Nicholl, Alistair Coleman, Andy Duncan and Steven Coleman went down 24-8 against D Hamilton and Andrew Bonnar, Jimmy Hodges, Mark Torrington and Jim Baker were also second best to S Bennett by a score of 30-8.