Bowling
Abbotsford
THE pairs competition reached the semi-final stages last week when Keith Campbell and Tommy Mann Jnr played Jimmy Grieve and Ecky Hancock.
Mann and Campbell took an early lead, but some exceptional bowls from Hancock ensured a close finish. In the end, Mann and Campbell went through in a close game with a high standard from both teams. They will play the final against either Jackie Hardie and Scott Thomson or John Hardie and Brian Anderson.
The pool competition played over the last few weeks was won by Kenny Johnstone with John Hardie the runner-up. Friday night’s match was against a Tom Thorburn select, and for the first time in many years both the home rinks suffered defeat to the visitors. The pairs competition afterwards was won by Peter Noble and Iain Macdonald who defeated Colin MacLeod and John Hardie.
The club AGM is today, March 21, at 7.30 p.m.
Langholm
THERE was a good attendance at the New Town Bowling Club AGM in the Royal British Legion clubrooms last Sunday.
Neil Campbell was elected president, with Robert Elliot as vice-president, Paul Mitchell is secretary, with Avril Grieve remaining treasurer.
The new season opens on Sunday, April 28, with a mixed pairs. Friendly matches have have been arranged against Langholm Old Town, Longtown and Eaglesfield.
There will be the usual open tournaments with the triples on Saturday, May 25, Castle Craigs pairs tournament on Saturday, July 20, and pairs on Saturday, September 7. The local factory cup has been arranged for Saturday, June 1.
Carpet Bowling
Borders
THE 2012/13 season started with the now traditional curtain raiser at Westruther, which was won in impressive style by the home pairing of Brian Mitchell and Darren Donaldson.
All roads then headed to Selkirk for our annual rinks competition which was won by a local Lindean team skipped by Bruce Jeffrey.
As the season hotted up, the tournament wins were being spread out between a huge number of players including Grant Buchannan, Stan Scott, Colin Skeldon, Jim Renwick and Stuart Skeldon. But it was Brian Mitchell and Bill Hedley who were setting the early pace in the player of the year race with three wins each.
During January, as the competitions came thick and fast, the wins again were being spread out, with Kevin Mercer starting to mount a title challange with a couple of victories at Fountainhall and Denholm.
In February, the biggest tournament of the season took place at Newcastleton, which saw victory going to a Coulter rink skipped expertly by Gus Kennedy.
As we entered the start of March and with only two events left, the title of player of the year could have gone to any one of eight players. These last two events were dominated by Cappercleugh men – Ryan Simpson and Donald Clark taking the silverware home.
All of this gave us a final standing in the player of the year of as follows: 1, Kevin Mercer (Fountainhall); 2, Bill Hedley (Westruther); 3, Brian Mitchell (Westruther).
After winning his third title in four years, Mercer said: “Every year, the challenge of coming out on top in the Borders competitions gets tougher and tougher as the standards of players is very even and you never get a easy game.
“As great as winning this trophy is, the most important message is that it is a friendly competition, with some light-hearted banter, and I would recommend to anyone wanting to try, come along and give it a go.
Langholm
THERE was an entry of 32 for the single-handed carpet bowling tournament in the Langholm Royal British Legion clubrooms last Sunday and the winner of the Tagg Hogg cup was Jim Little of Gretna.
In a tightly fought final, which went to an extra end, he beat John Aitken from Kilncadzow.
Ali Sloan from Johnstonebridge was knocked out in the semi-final, along with local player Colin Reid.
Neil Campbell thanked the bar staff and everyone else who had helped make the tournament a success and his fellow organiser Paul Warwick presented the cup to the winner.
Orienteering
Roxburgh Reivers
THE Stirling area hosted the latest round of the UK Orienteering League last weekend, with a middle distance race based at Tulliallan Police College on Saturday and a classic long-distance race in the Trossachs on Sunday.
With people from all over the UK taking part, competition was fierce and top-five placings were always going to be hard to achieve, but Karen Maxwell had a superb run in W18 to take third place and Barry Veitch secured fourth spot in M40 after an injury layoff.
Sunday’s race was one of the most challenging in the UK, combining very technical terrain with sodden underfoot conditions. John Tullie maintained his winning streak in M55 and Robin Sloan took first place on M65.
Pool
Borders
THERE were only three league cup games as the groups came to a conclusion, with High Level B whitewashing Bridge B in a meaningless game, while Station blew away Reivers B to top the group and look favourites to join Waverley A, High Level A and Reivers A in the semi-finals. Reivers A won the other game, edging out Dryburgh to stay unbeaten in their group .
The semi-finals of the KO Cup this week sees Ship A take on Niki’s and Reivers A play Dryburgh for third succesive week in a different competition, with Reivers A hoping to stay undefeated against an improving Dryburgh.
Results – Group A: Reivers B (Gala) 2 Station (Hawick) 7; High Level B (Hawick) 9 Bridge B (Gala) 0. Group B: Reivers A (Gala) 5 Dryburgh (Newtown) 4.
Snooker
Jean Yule Cup
Semi-final results (Cup): Hawick Con A 2 Hawick Burns A 4; St Boswells 4 Innerleithen 2. Plate: Jedburgh Legion 4 Selkirk A 0; Border Club 4 Hawick Burns B 3.
Border Singles Championships
QUARTER-FINAL results: C. King 0 L. McAllistair 3; I. McCombe (no show) G. Kinnear (WO); J. Callon 2 R. Bell 3; B Callaghan 0 F. Kelly 3
Tennis
St Boswells
A THUMPING win over Selkirk on Sunday ensured that St Boswells I finished top of Group A in the Tennis Borders Winter League.
The team will now go on to face either Duns I or Peebles in the semi-final.
Recording another 4-0 win, the home team of Lynn Bruce, Lewis Armstrong, Hilary Jackson and Simon Blair dropped just seven games in eight sets
St Boswells II had an outside chance of also securing a semi-final spot from Group B, requiring a win and other results to go their way.
However, a hard-fought draw against Earlston left them in third place in the group stage.
The second team were: Jenell Arnott, Adam Drummond, Linda Geddes and Charles Strang.