DORCHESTER 83

VICTORIA CLUB STREET 58

DORCHESTER continued their solid progress in the Denny Cup with a straight-forward 83-58 victory over Victoria Bowls Club Street.

As a result, Dorchester earn a last-16 fixture against Exonia (Exeter) who are one of the competition favourites.

Although a keen tussle with the Somerset side was on the cards, the game turned out to be far less competitive than expected.

An outstanding performance from one of the Dorchester home rinks all but killed the game off at an early stage.

A landslide win for Kevin Holbrook, Dave Tremlin, Roger Nicholas and George Spracklen produced an eye-watering 39-7 score against the Street four skipped by the luckless Stan Whitehead.

Street were marginally in touch at 11-7, but Spracklen then took the game by the scruff of the neck.

They proceeded to take all of the remaining 10 ends – amassing 28 more shots without reply.

A more even game was played out on the neighbouring rink where Street had the experienced Steve Hooper skipping a rink against the town’s four of Brian Paulson, Terry Greenman, Colin Gifford and skip Darren Nutman.

Trailing by a single shot at 5-4, Nutman and company gradually got the measure of their opponents, managed to take the lead and then inched further and further ahead, to post a very workmanlike 21-16 result.

The Dorchester away rinks were therefore never under any meaningful pressure.

Ged Costello, deputising for the unavailable Nick Voss, was well supported by John Lawlor and Dave Joslin.

The triple managed to hold the talented Street skip Neil Kunc to a late narrow 17–15 advantage, before stumbling over the final three ends to finish a disappointing 25-15 adrift.

Dorchester’s promising 15-year-old James Roe made his Denny Cup debut for the county town side and led confidently for Dorchester’s International Martin Puckett.

Puckett was accompanied by Phil Hallett and Dean Curtis, as they outscored Street skip Rob Probert and his rink 23-10.

Puckett recorded either a brace or a triple score on his winning ends, but restricted the opposition to singles on all but one of their nine winning ends.

Dorchester will now be aiming for a quarter-final place, in a New Year fixture against their star-studded Exonia opponents, knowing they will have to be at their very best to stay in the competition.