Stephen Gale successfully retained his MSMBA 4 Bowl Singles title for a third successive year, his 6th overall after beating Michael Collister 10-8 in the final.
Final – As It Happened
| S GALE | M COLLISTER | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Point | Total | End | Point | Total |
| – | – | one | 4 | 4 |
| – | – | two | 1 | 5 |
| 1 | 1 | three | – | 5 |
| – | 1 | four | 1 | 6 |
| 3 | 4 | five | – | 6 |
| 3 | 7 | six | – | 6 |
| 1 | 8 | seven | – | 6 |
| – | 8 | eight | 2 | 8 |
| 1 | 9 | nine | – | 8 |
| 1 | 10 | ten | – | 8 |
| 10 | total | 8 | ||
The day started with three preliminary rounds which saw Mary Bailey cause a shock by beating Chris Holland 10-5. Bernie Durcan beat James Teare 17-3 while Stephen Grant, playing his first game in an MSMBA competition beat Ali Millard 11-4.
The first round proper saw Stephen Gale beat Percy Faragher 23-2 while Michael Collister came through 24-2 against Sheila Durcan. Stephen Bradley beat Mary Bailey 11-7 and Seamus Whelan beat Tony Quine 10-8. Bernie Durcan came from behind to beat Patrick Grant 10-4. Stephen Grant has a 23-3 victory over John Garrett while Dave McCabe beat Zawar Hussain 12-7 and Steve Durcan ended Collin Hollands hopes with an 11-6 win.
Into the quarter-finals and Gale came through a tough game against Bernie Durcan 12-4 while Collister beat McCabe 12-7. Steve Durcan beat Stephen Grant 11-5 and Whelan beat Bradley 14-3.
The semi-finals saw Gale come through with an impressive 18-3 victory over Whelan while Collister took the last end to beat Durcan 9-7.
The final saw Collister get off to a perfect start with a 4 on the opening end and was 6-1 up after the fourth end. Gale came back with two scores of the lead 7-6 but two ends later scores were back to all-square with two ends to play. Gale managed to draw shot on the penultimate end and with his first bowl on the final end, perfectly ditched the jack to leave Collister with no shot to play.
The MSMBA takes a break now until the 8th January. The MSMBA would like to wish all members a Merry Christmas and a happy New Year.