Ottery St Mary Petanque Club hosted a charity event to raise money for Hospicecare, writes Dave West.

Despite overnight rain, the Sunday event was blessed with dry and fine weather as players from Honiton Petanque Club joined home club players and petanque enthusiasts from North Devon, Plymouth and Cornwall to enjoy a fine day’s sport and raise money for a most worthy cause.

The 16 doubles teams played in four leagues in the morning to decide who made it to the afternoon Shield and Plate events, with the top two from each league getting into the Shield knockout.

Keeping it in the family, two Ottery teams headed their leagues, John and Rose Thatcher and Peter and Sue Smith; the other two top spots were taken by Graeme Kirkham with Sue Williamson and Carol and Den Williams.

During the lunch break, more fundraising came from fun events: Graeme Kirkham won the shooting, Peter Smith the pointing and John Thatcher was best at throwing the jack.

The Otters provided two of the finalists in the afternoon knock outs which produced hard fought games.

Peter and Sue Smith lost 13-7 to Cornish duo Graeme Kirkham and Sue Williamson in the Shield event, while in the Plate, Ed McCarthy and Mike Bird were beaten by the narrowest of margins, 13-11, by Plymouth pairing Mike Caroll and Mike Newberry.

Entry fees of £10 per team helped raise £160 and £24 was received in donations. In addition a magnificent raffle raised £131 and the fun events added £75.

Mathematicians will realise that the grand total came to £390 for the real winners - Hospicecare.

Ottery Petanque Club chairman, John Thatcher, thanked everyone who had donated raffle prizes and to those who pulled together giving time and effort to make the day a success.