WEEKLY UPDATE 13 APRIL 2025

Pairs Quarter Finals this week - three at Princeville and one at Pudsey.

At Princeville the action started on Monday, with Trevor and Gareth Kershaw playing Jeremy Dixon and Ian Ford. The first game was close, with Gareth eventually beating Ian by 6, before Trevor stormed to a 400-267 victory over Jeremy, including breaks of 39 and 30. Trevor commented afterwards that he hasn't played much better than that in a long time. (Looks like the right time of the season to be coming into form!!). Sid Ash has been in good form all season, and it continued on Tuesday against Brain Robinson. I was refereeing on the other table but Sid seemed to be in play every time I looked across. Brain only got to 143 and most of those seemed to come after Sid had passed 180. There was then a bit of a marathon session, as Ihjaz Hussain attempted to repair the damage against John Allan. A 37 break at one stage helped Ihjaz along the way but John held on to win 400-376.

It would be fair to say that it was a very slow start to the first game on the other table, as both Edward Lawson and Ralph Allan both struggled to get the scoreboard moving. Edward gradually started to pull away and a win by 40+  looked on the cards as he passed 180, but then Ralph suddenly looked a completely different player as he came charging through towards the end, and Edward had to rely on a rather fortunate 6 shot (balls in two different pockets ) to get home by 3. This left me starting 190-147 in front, against Richard Bowes, and chances seemed to come my way to add to this lead in the early stages. Richard's 46 break (14 in-off reds with the white ball stuck in baulk) made me think that maybe I hadn't made enough from those early chances, but Richard wasn't able to conjure up another significant break and I sneaked home 400-380.

Dave Howarth provided the following report on the match at Pudsey:

Peter (Allan) started quite well helped by a few trademark flukes, but once Mick (Cockcroft) got his eye in, also assisted by some handy running, he eventually closed in on Pete around the 175 mark & finished the game off well (201-186 to Mick).

In my game, both Chris (Jarvis) & I scratched around for a while, but after about 10 minutes, our scoring became more frequent. I was able to maintain a decent lead for a fair way, until Chris made a well worked 36 break, which got him to within about 20. He then caught & just passed me around 372. This set things up for, what ended up being a nervy finish. Both of us spurned some fairly easy chances with the winning post in sight. I think I just had the slightly better running at the end to sneak me home. It could quite easily have gone the other way though. At 400-393 Mick & Chris can consider themselves to be a bit unlucky.

This coming week is the final of the Play Off competition between Pudsey B and Princeville C. To avoid a clash with a bowls match at Littlemoor on Tuesday, the match has been switched to Thursday. Good luck to both teams who finished first and second in this season's league table.

The following week (22nd April) is the quarter finals of the Individual Billiards competition and, as far as I know, all four games are being played on the scheduled Tuesday evening date, but the Individual Snooker quarter finals the following week, clash with a couple of holiday commitments, so two of the games at Princeville are being played ahead of schedule on Thursday 24th April.

Stephen Kershaw

Secretary