Wide Boys snatch victory

Skimmers 432 Colliton Wide Boys 436

Colliton Wide Boys some how managed to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat (or was it Skimmers snatching defeat from the jaws of victory). The closer plates certainly benefited Skimmers who have been struggling in recent weeks at home. The scores were slightly higher than a good score from games when the pins are on their original plates, but it definitely helps having smaller gaps. There was not a huge number of stick-ups (5 to Skimmers and 3 for Wide Boys) because the heavy pins don't roll around very much.

Wide Boys threw first and started with a 61 hand that Skimmers managed to better by 1 pin. Skimmers then hit a 73 hand against Wide Boys 63 and followed that by pulling another 4 pins on the third hand to leave them 15 pins up. Wide Boys had an excellent score of 73 (only one score below 8) on the fourth hand that was bolstered by a 16 from anchor man Justin Hallett. Skimmers then countered with a 67 hand themselves to stay 9 pins ahead.

Wide Boys had their worst hand of the game (54) on the fifth hand and were feeling that the game was now all over. Fortunately for Wide Boys Skimmers only managed a 55 hand themselves to be 10 pins up with two hands to play. Wide Boys then hit 67 on the penultimate hand, aided by a 15 pin stick-up from Matt Slade. It was looking like Wide Boys were going to be in front going into the last hand until Skimmers anchor man Derek Knight hit a 11 pin stick-up to keep them 2 in front.

Throwing first on the last hand Wide Boys skittled OK to hit 59 which meant that Skimmers required 58 to win (a score that they had only failed to hit once all night). Their top half struggled to hit 27 and it came down to their last man needing 11 to win which he was unable to do.