Hard fought victory as locals brave windy conditions on visit to Ewarts

On a windy afternoon in North Belfast, the Dunbarton A team scraped their way to a hard fought seven shot victory against Ewarts, gaining five points in the process.

Over recent years, this has been a bogey ground for the locals and for the vast majority of Saturday afternoon it looked like the locals were going to come away with a defeat.

Myles Greenfield and his front three finished the highest rink up with a crucial eight shot success, while comeback kings, Marty Trainor’s rink did it again winning their last eight ends to chalk up a six shot success.

Rink 1 J Moffatt, C Mulholland, P Convery, DJ Wilson down 13-19

DJ’s four started slowly and never really recovered on a very tricky rink. After the first quarter they trailed 2-6 and by the midpoint their deficit had increased to seven shots, 5-12. Over the final ends, the locals won four of these to cut the deficit to six shots by the close.

Rink 2 C Trainor, R McElroy, G McElroy, C McCartan down 18-19

Skip Conor and his rink got off to an horrific start to trail 0-10 after just four ends. However to their credit, the men in yellow fought back well and thanks to scores of 2,2,2,1,2 from ends 7-11 and suddenly the visitors were within one shot of their rivals, 10-11. Three successive doubles from ends 14-16 saw the visitors move in front 16-13, only for the loss of a count of four on end seventeen and they were behind again by one shot. And despite their best efforts, this was the way the game finished.

Rink 3 M Higgins, T Bell, A Hughes, M Greenfield up 25-17

Over the first quarter of this game it was the hosts who started the brighter scoring four singles to lead 4-1. Ends six and seven however proved pivotal as excellent scores of 4 and 6 saw the locals storm into the lead. The loss of a poor count of five shots on end nine threatened to ruin things for Myles’ men. By the close of the allotted 21 ends, they emerged victorious by eight shots.

Rink 4 D Copeland, J Kelly, M Merritt, M Trainor up 23-17

With their team struggling overall, the Gilford foursome took the game by the scruff of the neck. Amazingly they won all of the final eight ends with scores of 4,1,1,2,1,1,3,1 for a tremendous six shot success. This was the difference between Dunbarton winning or losing this game.