Another busy week for Sidmouth bowlers began with the ladies contesting a County Lane League meeting with neighbouring Budleigh, writes Carol Smith.

Of the four rinks played – two at home and two away – Sidmouth managed to win both home rinks and draw one of the away ones. However, in terms of the overall score, the honours went to Budleigh by a margin of just four shots, 75-71.

This left 10 points up for grabs in the meeting shared with both teams banking five points for their efforts.

With two more matches to play in the campaign, Sidmouth are on track for a mid-table finish.

As for the successful home rinks, they comprised of Jenny Crow, Pat Harvie and skip Freda Humphries, who won 18-13, while Jackie Godbeer, Pat Poole and skip Elaine Reed won 21-16. Well done, ladies.

There was not such good news for the club’s Foxlands League team for they dished up a disappointing show in their meeting with Torbay, who took the match honours to the tune of a 94-54 score line.

It all meant ‘nil points’ for the Sidmouth team. The positives to take from the meeting? Well, one of the home teams and one of the away teams were beaten by the smallest of margins – a single shot!

That means the team ‘almost’ banked four points. There is one more match to be played in the Foxlands campaign and that is a rearranged fixture against Dawlish.

The ladies also played a rearranged fixture against Axminster ladies, who could only field two rinks (it was supposed to be three rinks versus three rinks).

There’s not too much we can say about the outcome – well, we can report the fact that it ended in a heavy defeat for Sidmouth with Axminster winning 40-21!

To finish the week there was an excellent day of bowling and socialising when we received a visit from West Berkshire, who have been visiting Sidmouth for many years now.

They come for a couple of days and stay at the same Sidmouth seafront hotel each year.

They say the food is always excellent – but added that this year it was outstanding!

In terms of the action, we played them over two sessions on Sunday.

The morning session saw two Sidmouth rinks suffer defeat and one enjoy success. This led to an overall 14 shot win for the visitors.

However, the tables were turned in the afternoon session with two home rinks winning and one suffering a defeat, which led to a 16 shot home win.

When the two sessions’ scores were combined, it left Sidmouth taking the overall honours by a margin of just two shots at 116-114. A very close and exciting game was settled as late as the penultimate end when Sidmouth edged ahead.

Away from the rink action, the company was great and very friendly, and, needless to say, we finished off with a drink or two.

Our friends from West Berkshire clearly enjoyed our hospitality and we most certainly look forward to seeing them all again next year.

As for the bowls – the successful Sidmouth morning rink was the one of Brian Barber, Chrissie Leedham, Phil Meadows and skip Susie Bonnell, who won 24-11 and the successful afternoon rinks were the ones of Ray Gray, Derek Mountford, Eileen Hewett and skip Carol Smith, who enjoyed a nine shot win at 25-16, but they were just beaten to the post in terms of the ‘biggest winning margin’ as the rink of Pat Hague, Janice Quinn, Mick Cox and skip Wilf Radburn won by 10 shots at 23-13.