National Skittles Finals - Saturday 17th May 2008

N.Ireland victorious in National Skittles Finals.
 
13 May be unlucky for some but not for the N.Ireland skittles team who won the 13th National Skittles Finals on Saturday 17th may 2008.
The N.Ireland region don't actually have a skittles alley and only started playing skittles when the Scotland BDE/SLE took a set of skittles and balls over from Rosyth some 11 or 12 years ago and ran a regional competition. As they say, the rest is history, although they still have no actual alley but mark one out on the floor of a sports hall, using second hand pins and balls from Rosyth. They are hoping this win may persuade the N.Ireland Civil Service to allow them to build a portable alley for them to use.
 
This year's finals had only 5 entries, due to the SW Region being unable to hold a regional event and the Welsh Region unable to get a team to the final due to Cardiff playing at Wembley, so the round robin was played with games of 5 legs as opposed to 3 in previous years. The matches were played in good spirit with Scotland, Midlands and N.Ireland. starting well. However Scotland failed to capitilise on a good start and lost their 2nd and 3rd matches, whilst the Midlands, after a loss in their 1st game won the next two with N.Ireland winning all three of their matches. The Southern Region who was last years winners failed to perform this year and lost two of their first 3 matches.
 
Going into the last games N.Ireland were two points ahead of the Midlands and with a superior pin total. N.Ireland suffered a defeat in their last game against the South and although the Midlands put up a valiant fight to beat Scotland with a very good score, and tie with N.Ireland on points, they were unable to claw back the N.Ireland pin total and lost by 20 pins.
 
As always it was a very enjoyable day and we congratulate Michael Hearty and his N.Ireland Team. My thanks go to the Cheltenham Club for hosting the event and to Peter Fischer for presenting our trophies and for presenting a Certificate of Recognition to Marjory Owen, who played skittles for the NW Region.

Photos - Top: Winners, N.Ireland, bottom: Runners-up, Midlands