Border men and women fight back

THE Border men's teams made amends for two morning losses against Sables on the second day of the South African B Inter-Districts Tournament yesterday with two great wins against North West.

In the morning games, skip Henry Sutherland (Alan Hogan, Wayne Porter and Alan Phayre) went down 24-12 while Curtis Smith (Mickey Underwood, Ulricht Steynberg and BJ van Heerden) lost 21-11.

The games were played in perfect overcast but humid conditions on a superb green prepared by the East London Bowling Club.

Both sides were in trouble from the start. While Border's leads and seconds, Porter and Phayre and Steynberg and Van Heerden, all had reasonably good games, the difference was in the back rank where Border were out-bowled by Mark Richardson and Cobus Smit (skips) and Craig Nicol and Pieter Briel.

The afternoon was a different story with Sutherland and Hogan (third), working off a solid platform laid by Phayre and Porter up front, keeping their side of the bargain with some immaculate drawing to win 32-13.

Although North West tried hard it just was not their day.

Smith was involved in a much more bitter fight against the North West team skipped by the team of Allan Kirkland. North West were a single shot up on the 15th end, then two up on the 16th before Border rallied in a great team effort to take the lead at 18-17.

Steady bowling up front by lead Van Heerden and Steynberg meant woods in the head and Underwood and Smith both showed their experience by closing out the game at 25-17 after picking up shots on the 21st end.

At Gonubie, the Border B women also lost both their morning games against Eastern Province, with Barbara Taylor's team going down 27-11 and Ebena Glasgow narrowly losing 20-18.

But like the Border men, they made it up in the afternoon with a clean sweep over Johannesburg Bowls with Glasgow winning 33-7 and Taylor scoring 25-23.

In Pretoria, where the Senior Inter-Districts is being held, play managed to take place yesterday morning after Monday's games were called off after 18 ends and all games cancelled in the afternoon.

In Bloemfontein, rain again caused havoc when all games in the Open Inter-Districts were called off yesterday. - Brian McLean