Castle Sports win 2021 Brunner Cup bowls tournament

CASTLE Sports claimed their 2nd Brunner Cup title in emphatic style at Runcorn Subscription Club on Saturday when they defeated Houldsworth WMC by 32 shots.

Many in the large crowd that had assembled at the Runcorn green had predicted a close battle for this year's right to be called Cheshire champions, and the first four games off the green on Saturday seemed to indicate that this would be the case.

The teams shared two winners each – Jason Cornes and Matt Hamman were the Castle winners, beating Damian Morrison and Lee Johnstone respectively with scores of 21-15 and 21-12.

The defeats for Castle in the first four games were two narrow loses for Robert Winnington 18-21 and Andy Hamman 17-21.

This gave Castle a lead of eight shots after the completion of the first four jacks.

It was in the middle four games that Castle made the decisive move in the final and established a lead that ultimately meant that Houldsworth would never recover.

John Gurney led the way with a 21-6 victory against Carl Armitage closely followed by another good win for Castle by Steven Baskerville (21-8).

Paul Mackie added to the dominance of Castle when he recorded a 21-14 victory. Steven Morrey was the only loser in the middle four for Castle when he lost out to Larry Wells 15-21.

This meant that Castle had established what looked like an unassailable lead as they established a 37-shot advantage going in to the last four games.

All Castle had to do now was to keep it tight to ensure the trophy returned to Northwich for the second time in four years.

Kevin Duncalf made a fine comeback in the ninth game of the day to beat George Chadwick 21-17 while Ian Howell recorded a fantastic win against Tommy Johnstone 21-20.

This meant the Brunner Cup was secured and losses for David O'Brien (12-21) and Paul Dooley (20-21) didn’t stop the Castle celebrations beginning before the final had come to a conclusion. The final score in the end 229-197 in Castle's favour

On accepting the trophy, Castle Sports captain Adi Faulkner dedicated the win to George Astbury, a long-time Castle member who sadly passed away earlier this year.