On Saturday morning Sidmouth men played Cornish team Veryan in the first round of the Denny Cup, writes Ken Wheeler.

This is a national team competition for men, played on a knock-out basis, and is open to every indoor club in England.

The standard is very high and Sidmouth is one of the smaller clubs to enter.

Each match normally comprises two rinks played at home and two rinks played simultaneously away. The winner is the team with the highest overall score.

With Veryan being well over 100 miles away, near Truro, it was decided on this occasion to play the complete match at a neutral venue (Plymouth) to ease the travelling for both sides. Sidmouth started brightly and took an early lead, which they maintained right up until the 14th end when they were leading overall 54-49.

At that point Sidmouth’s first ever win in the competition looked distinctly possible, but then suddenly Sidmouth collapsed and eventually lost by 32 shots.

Sidmouth did manage to win one of the four rinks, that of Ray Tallent, John Chew, Peter Mison and skip Brian Smith, who won 18-16.

The only consolation is that Sidmouth automatically qualified for the Denny Plate, a competition open to all first-round losing teams. They will play Kingsley, who are based near Westward Ho! (another long journey!) on Saturday November 3.