Bowls: West Lothian ladies bow out of Scottish Cup

The ladies of West Lothian IBC have enjoyed a relatively good season and given an encouraging account of themselves in League and Cup arenas, however, their progress in the Scottish Cup came to an end with a second-round exit.

It was a bold display against Abbeyview at the neutral Dalkeith stadium but the Dunfermline opposition proved just a touch too strong and triumphed 75-69. The match picture did look bright on the first seven-end phase with WL 31-20 up however they suffered a 30-16 loss of the second and Abbeyview stayed resolute to edge the third, 25-22.

Ann Clark did manage to skip her rink to victory by a few shots but Wendy Purdie, Jennifer Sneddon, and Jenifer Richardson suffered narrow defeats.

Clark produced a run of 4, 3, 3 to skip Irene Taylor, Isabel Lindsay and Lily Sword into a healthy 13-5 lead after eight ends but then came under severe pressure and was crossed 16-15 before hitting back to beat M Paxton 22-19.

Purdie also made an encouraging start to skip Eleanor Tollan, Lucy Noon and Claire Watson into an 8-2 lead over Anne Bernard but in a ding-dong battle they went down to an 18-16 defeat.

Sneddon and her rink of Betty Tate, Liz Rogers and Lisa Barrett were 9-6 ahead after nine ends but the loss of 1, 5 brought them under pressure and in another hard fought confrontation they slipped to a 19-16 defeat from M Davies.

Richardson and her front-three of Jean McPherson, Jean Brown and Helen Tully conceded six shots on their third end and it was uphill all the way after that so they did well to only lose 19-15 to Agnes Hutchison.

Meanwhile, the clash of joint favourites Midlothian and East Fife resulted in the 88-73 demise of the Dalkeith challengers in a cracking encounter and the Methil side will play Abbeyview in the quarter-finals.

West of Scotland v Coatbridge; Auchinleck v Blantyre and Turriff v Aberdeen are the other ties in the last eight stage of the Cup.

n GOOD news for two West Lothian IBC stars comes with the announcement from the national bodies that Inveralmond captain Thomas Mann is pulled in as a reserve for the international team while former national singles champion Wendy Purdie is promoted to skip a rink at Swansea.

n GEORGE SNEDDON’S spell as manager of Bowls Scotland International Team has come to and end with him moving over to work with the Elite programme so a replacement for the high-profile Broxburn and West Lothian star is being sought. The closing date for application to Bowls Scotland is Wednesday, February 29.