Sidmouth take the lead after leg one of the Picture Match meeting with East Devon

On Sunday, Sidmouth played two representative games, writes John Barnard.

The first was the annual two legged match against East Devon, known as the Picture Match.

One of the older sporting events in East Devon, it hasn’t been very kind to Sidmouth in recent years, but team captain and cup winner Mark Thomas selected a strong looking team on paper. Played over 36 holes, the morning is played as foursomes and the afternoon, individual match play.

It didn’t start well, quickly two matches down, but captain Thomas and Nick Gingell had a good 4 and 3 win. It looked like it was slipping away again as East Devon got two more points, but Sidmouth won two of the last three matches to go in for lunch with an acceptable 5-3 deficit.

In the afternoon, Sidmouth lost the first three matches, but Jonathan Lee steadied the ship with a good win, closely followed by Captain Thomas. The ‘tail’ then really began to wag and the afternoon matches ended 8-8, so, a 13-11 deficit to bring back to Sidmouth. This was one of the best results achieved by Sidmouth in many years and gives hope that the famous Picture can be brought back to our clubhouse.

Also playing were Sidmouth B team, away at Teign Valley. Captained by Colin Macklin, he selected his good friend Bob Welsman as his partner and they halved their match although leading for quite a while. The next match was also halved but then, three out of the next four matches were won by Sidmouth. Lester Willmington and Steve Johnson won 2-1, Sean Murphy and Harrison Jones (two big hitters) had a great 4-3 win and finally, Bob Andrews and Malcolm Willoughby won, two up. An excellent four-and-two win for Mack’s lads.