Great week for Leigh Park as Milton and Denmead celebrate title wins – Portsmouth Bowls League round-up

In a rearranged match, Park claimed a 24-shot victory by winning on three rinks. Leading the way was the rink of Jamie Ward, who won by 13 shots - despite dropping a seven!

On Friday, leaders Waverley had the night off, so Priory had high hopes of cutting into their lead as they hosted Leigh Park.

However, Park spoiled the party by adjusting to the surface a lot better and ran out winners by 27 shots. They won on three rinks, led again by Jamie Ward’s rink who won by 16.

That shock defeat meant they were overtaken by Fareham, who compounded Alex’s bad week by beating them by 28 shots. They won on three rinks, led by the 22-shot triumph by Charlie Bailey’s quartet.

Rowner thrashed Waterlooville by 68 shots, achieving big wins on all four rinks, led by the 20-shot victory on Barry Stafford’s rink.

The other match was between the two bottom clubs, with Cowplain beating Lee-on-the-Solent by 17 shots.

The carpet club made full use of their surface to win on three rinks, led by Bryan Franklin’s quartet. However, the win didn’t really help Cowplain’s fight against relegation, but it did put more pressure on the Solent club, who have matches in

hand on their rivals – but two of them are against Waverley.

With the top two meeting in their final match of the season, both Milton Park and Vospers had to win their games to keep the pressure on each other at the top of Division 2.

Milton Park did their bit with a 34-shot victory at Portsmouth Water. They won on all

Four rinks, led by the 13-shot victory by Mick Molloy’s rink.

Meanwhile, at Gosport, three of Vospers rinks were keeping to the script and battling to help Vospers win - finally successful on two and drawing the other.

However, the message didn’t get through to the four rink, who crashed to a 42-shot defeat at the hands of Simon Batcheler’s Gosport quartet. In fact, the Gosport team must have been annoyed to let their opponents pick up a single shot on two of the last four ends!

Those two results meant that Milton have won the division, whilst Vospers will finish second.

Star & Crescent made full use of home advantage to beat already relegated Naismith by 37 shots. They won on three rinks, led by the 29-shot win by Simon Filippi’s rink. Howard Davis’ rink prevented a whitewash.

The top two in Division 3 met at Northern Parade with Gas Social taking on leaders Denmead. It was a match Gas HAD to win to have any chance of overtaking them.

The game was a titanic struggle that went down to the last end. At that point, Gas had a two-shot lead, having won two rinks and the third going to Denmead.

On the fateful last rink, Gas were up by six shots going into the last end. But they couldn’t hold their nerve as they dropped four to Glyn Jones’ Denmead rink, thereby losing the match by two shots and handing the title to their opponents.

Bridgemary hosted Purbrook Heath in another titanic battle, which ended in an epic 73-73 draw. However, Bridgemary took the majority of the points by winning on three rinks.

A 17-shot win on Tony Hall’s rink meant the game was tied.