THE second round of the Weymouth & District League Hand-icap Cup threw up some Christ-mas crackers of contests, with five of the eight matches going the full distance in the best of nine-leg format.

The highest-ranked team left in the competition, and only survivors from Division One are Pilgrims A after scoring a 5-4 victory over Division Two table toppers Budmouth B.

Having fought back from 3-1 and 4-2 down, they won the final three legs of the tie including Richard Wilshire coming from a set down in the decider against Daren Graham.

While Budmouth B were going out, Budmouth C and reigning cup holders, Budmouth D, went head-to-head on an adjacent table.

Budmouth D knocked out their higher-ranked counterparts last year 5-0 in the first round and the handicaps seemed to favour them again this year.

There was never more than one leg in the game with the C team taking the lead each time, only for D to fight back and level.

The highlight of the night was Jamie Blair beating Will Jolliffe 21-19 in the decider after making up an eight-point deficit. These two are definitely ones to look out for in the future.

Ethan Gear played very well in claiming all three of his legs to see Budmouth D through to the next round with a final leg win over James Green.

Springfield B overcame Steps in another 5-4 encounter. Spring-field initially fell behind but then took a crucial 4-2 lead with three straight legs from Angela Small-bone, Dave Moth and Paul Man-vell. Sam Holden and Jon Clarke levelled matters before Manvell secured his team’s quarter-final place with victory over Liam Lewis.

Ben Hannigan was the star of the show for All Saints in their 5-4 victory over Colliton C. He won all three of his legs including the crucial ninth leg against Mark Whittingham after Colliton had fought back from 4-1 down to take it to a decider.

Whittingham also won the first set of that decider before Hanni-gan stormed back to take the third 21-19.

Budmouth E trailed 2-0 and 3-1 against Dorset Youth B and with the relatively inexperienced Har-riet Pullen filling in for April Heasman, things did not look good for them.

Pullen lost her opening two legs but Snigdha Maganti won all three of hers and with Erin Stow chipping in with a leg also, it meant Pullen had to win the decider against Les Gardner.

She managed to pull around the third set from 19-17 down to win it 21-19 and seal the 5-4 win.

Springfield A made light work of Pilgrims B by only dropping one leg in a 5-1 victory, though half of those legs did go to the full three sets. Preston A beat Wyke C by the same scoreline with Derek Shilladay and Eddie Chapman both taking two legs after Roger Lovell had taken the opening leg for them.

QUARTER-FINAL DRAW

Wyke D/Preston D v Budmouth E, Springfield A v Budmouth D, All Saints v Preston A, Pilgrims A v Springfield B.