It was a busy night once again in the Carlisle Thursday Billiards League with ten games taking place.
The first match saw Neil Walby maintain his 100 per cent record and for the third week running score over 300 points when he beat Paul Heslop.
It finished 338-323 after a very tight game that saw some great potting of the red by both players, with Neil just managing to take the lead in the last few minutes.
Paul Scott won his first match of the season against Michael Waring 341-295. Paul had a couple of 23 breaks and was scoring well with the red and cannons.
In one of the closest games of the evening, Nigel Lewthwaite won by 9 points (259-250) against Mark Taylor in a game that was for the billiard purist with lots of in-offs and cannons. There were no big breaks, but consistent scoring by both players.
Higher scoring breaks came from three of the local players who play World Billiards Tournaments around the UK during the year. Once they are in the groove, their quality shines through.
Paul Cowing, in his match against Peter Dean, played really well and constructed breaks of 51, 47 , 47 to win the match 345-275.
Paul Whelan took on double duty and played two matches, beating Brian Sloan in his first match (341-213) with breaks of 54 & 30 included.
However, he came up short in his second match against Stu Burgess, despite breaks of 39 and 36, losing by an agonising two points 279-277.
The third of the Tour players Mike Griffiths continues to score heavily in his matches, but his handicap is lower than all the rest of the league.
So despite breaks of 48, 33, 24, 20 and an unfinished 21, he was unable to close the gap on Dave Turley, who had a break of 28 to win 293-264.
In Turley’s other match he lost 274-272 to Paul Heslop, another clash that was extremely tight. It’s amazing to think that so many matches that are played over one hour end up being decided by two or three points in the final 30 seconds of the match.
Burgess moved to the top of the Red Division league when he beat John Metcalfe 302-241, in a game of two halves.
John fought hard to recover the handicap, but then hit a brick wall in the last 20 minutes and Stu’s consistent scoring at the table was enough to win the match.
The final match involved Dave Midgely and Archie Walker. Dave is still recovering from injury, but fought through the pain with breaks of 34 and 30 to win the match by 4 points (295-291).
RED DIVISION LEAGUE
Stu Burgess (9)
Neil Walby (9)
Brian Sloan (6)
Ian Cleminson (4)
Paul Whelan (3)
John Metcalfe (3)
Paul Heslop (3)
Mike Griffiths (3)
Dave Turley (2)
WHITE DIVISION LEAGUE
Peter Stanyer (7)
Archie Walker (7)
Paul Cowing (7)
Mark Taylor (5)
Dave Midgely (5)
Michael Waring (3)
Simon Elston (3)
Paul Scott (3)
Nigel Lewthwaite (0)
Peter Dean (0)
