Ryan Brannan became the first ever Fitz Park Bowling Club member to win the county under 25 singles trophy when he defeated Ryan Corkhill, of Whitehaven, in front of a large crowd at The Croft Bowling Club, Cockermouth.
A good following of supporters from the Keswick club saw Ryan, aged 24, finally overcome the strong challenge of Corkhill, 19, after the pair played some exceptional ends, much to the enjoyment of the crowd, writes Keith Richardson.
The two significant breakthroughs in a tightly contested match came with the score on 12/11 to the Keswick player. Before that the game was nip and tuck.
Both players were on the jack more often than not but Brannan took a three shot end to extend his lead to 15/11 and never looked back. He hammered home his superiority with a second successive three shot advantage on the next end as Corkhill faded to go 18/11 down.
The final blow came with Brannan ahead 20/11 and seemingly destined to lift the trophy. However, players have suffered demoralising defeats before after the final point proves a point too far and an opponent stages a dramatic comeback. But it was not to be on this occasion.
Corkhill was holding shot – and possibly more – when Brannan played arguably the shot of the match to trail the jack through the head onto his own woods and claim two shots to take his score beyond the 21 shots needed to win the contest.
This was a very good final and Corkhill played his part to the full, although Brannan eventually proved the more assured, consistent, and confident player on the night. He will now go through to represent his club, his town, and the county at the national finals at Leamington, starting on August 25 and running for 18 days until September 11.
The Under 25 trophy was presented to Ryan by Brian Taylor, of Carlisle, who won the trophy 50 years ago.
On the same evening at The Croft, the crowd also enjoyed the semi-finals of the county men’s singles. Stephen Cook, of Workington, defeated Mark Nanson, of the Subscription Club (Carlisle) reasonably comfortably but it was much closer in the other tie between the eventual winner Mark Irwin (Aspatria) and Ian Williams (Workington). Irwin appeared to be cruising to victory but Williams staged a dramatic comeback and, with the score 20/19 to Irwin, the tie could have gone either way.
However, Irwin clinched the all-important shot in a tensioned-filled final end, much to his immense relief; a relief that was equalled only by the exasperation felt by Williams.
Congratulations to The Croft for staging the event and also to the county officials on a job well done – markers Henry Stewart, Hugh Crosbie and Graham Shepherd and umpire Martyn Paige.
