St Chad Bowling Club raises £3,000 for Stroke Association

Club president David Wharf (right) presents a £3,000 cheque to Karen Cavanagh of the Stroke Association (Image: St Chad's) <i>(Image: St Chad's)</i>
Club president David Wharf (right) presents a £3,000 cheque to Karen Cavanagh of the Stroke Association (Image: St Chad's) (Image: St Chad's)
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St Chad's Bowling Club's sponsors, T Cribb & Sons Funeral Directors, would have been delighted to see five club finals dedicated to them decided in glorious weather, with the green benefiting from some much-needed rainfall.

To crown an excellent week for the club, president David Wharf presented a cheque for £3,000 to St Chad's chosen charity for the season, the Stroke Association.

The donation was accepted by Karen Cavanagh, whose tireless fundraising efforts played a major role in reaching the impressive total.

Bernard Dowley continued his strong run of form on Friday, teaming up with Peter Fielding to win the two-wood pairs competition.

The pair defeated Janet Mansell and Keith Hutton 24-10.

That was followed by a thrilling men's handicap singles final in which the handicapping proved spot-on.

Experienced campaigner Les Crowther defeated rising star Steve Agius 21-18 after a hard-fought contest.

Crowther controlled the early stages with clever placement of the jack and appeared to be cruising to victory before Agius found his rhythm.

The youngster chipped away at the deficit with a series of strong ends, but his late comeback fell just short as Crowther held on to claim the title.

The Ladies Championship was another closely fought affair, with Janet Mansell and Glynis Wadey battling for almost two hours in a 25-end marathon.

With most ends won by just one or two shots, the scores remained level throughout and stood at 18-all entering the closing stages.

Mansell edged ahead 19-18, added another shot for a two-shot cushion and then produced a decisive final end, picking up four shots to seal the championship.

Another finely matched contest came in the fixed jack final, an unusual format in which the best four bowls score on every end, with players aiming to reach a target of 101 points.

The score was level at 35-all, 50-all and 60-all, underlining how evenly matched Les Crowther and Ray Mansell were during the opening hour.

Crowther then enjoyed a purple patch, collecting maximum points on several ends to surge into a 97-73 lead.

Mansell refused to surrender and made his opponent fight for every point, but Crowther eventually reached the target to become a worthy champion.

The final match of the week was the blue-riband event, the men's championship, contested by Steve Agius and Bernard Dowley.

After early nerves, the scores were level at 6-6 before Agius battled back to trail only 14-12.

Dowley then opened a five-shot advantage at 19-14, only for Agius to level the contest once more at 19-all.

In a tense finish, Dowley took two shots on the final end to secure both the match and the men's championship title.

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