Bowls: Midlothian maintain A status with key victory

Published on Monday 14 December 2009 08:56

MIDLOTHIAN haven't enjoyed the best of campaigns in the A section of the indoor bowls Premier League but at least the threat of relegation has been banished by their well-deserved win over Prestwick at Dalkeith.

Prestwick arrived as joint leaders so had everything to play for but Midlothian proved to be the stronger on three of the four rinks and posted an 82-75 victory – their fourth win in eight games. And when news filtered thought that Auchinleck had lost at home to Lanarkshire and Arbroath away to West Lothian, the Dalkeith camp knew they were clear of the bottom two with two fixtures still to fulfil.

Colin Walker was a late absentee from the Midlothian line-up and his place was filled by reinstating Willie Rankin to skip and bringing back Martin Wylie as his third. Rankin proved a success along with David and Billy Peacock as winning skips and their combined surplus of 21 shots covered the loss of 14 suffered by Graeme Archer at the hands of Robert McCulloch. Midlothian edged the first seven ends, 28-22 then the second, 30-29 before settling for a 24-24 peel on the third.

The match opened in dramatic fashion with Archer and his rink of Calum Crawford, David Salkeld and Ian Brown losing a seven at the first end and it looked bleak when a losing run of 5, 1, 1, 2 put them 21-5 down after 12 ends.

Archer and Co stopped the rot with a run of 1, 1, 1, 2 to 10 and finally settled for a 26-12 defeat.

David Peacock compensated with an encouraging 4, 3 start and, by the 11th end, had skipped Robert Campbell jun, Sandy Knight and Lindsay Plenderleith into an 18-6 lead over R Smith, setting up a 26-17 victory.

Billy Peacock skipped Ronnie Duncan, Ian Forbes and Graham Walker into an 8-1 lead after five ends. They were generally well held after that but conjured up a 2, 2 finish at 18-16 up to beat P Boyd, 22-16.

Rankin skipped Steven Currie, Robert Trench and Martin Wylie into a 16-2 lead after 11 ends but they lost a six at the next and, coming under pressure, battled well to beat D Boyd, 22-16.