St. Laurence’s KWWIBA promotion hopes still alive after emphatic victory

This Division 2 bowling league match saw the Rathcoffey team having to make the long journey down to the St. Laurence’s venue to take on the home side. Each side would know the importance of the outcome for difference reasons.

Rathcoffey not quite sure of being in the safe zone as of yet would be bidding to muster a couple of points to climb a little higher in the table. They will be mindful of the result in their previous outing away from home against Baltinglass/Kiltegan where they were comprehensively beaten.

Another poor result would certainly put some pressure on them with only two more games to play.

In contrast, St. Laurence’s are at the other end of the scale and have no worries about relegation. Five points from this match would push them into second place in the table and in the promotion category. Home advantage should definitely give them an edge and maybe after been beaten by the same opposition in their away game will be the motivating factor to drive them on.

Rampant and Confident

Mat 1 started off as if it would be a cracking game of bowls as both sides settled in quickly. The exchanges were very much even par, with the lead changing hands for the first five ends.

From that point onwards things turned sour for the visitors as the home team completely took over and dominated and controlled the game to the finish. Except for the odd score here and there for Rathcoffey they were never given any slack that would allow them to make any inroads against a rampant and confident St. Laurences.

St. Laurence’s: Anthony Archibold, Paddy Lawlor, Willie Fennin, Mick O’Rourke and sub Peter Hyland.

Another Gear

On Mat 2 the visitors got a wonderful start by putting three on the scoreboard, but the ‘Larries’ response was swift with a score on each of the next two ends to leave it at 3/2 in favour of the visitors. Rathcoffey increased that to 4/2 but on the sixth end the home side had it all square at 4/4.  This was turning into a keen contest with brilliant bowls being played by both teams.

This trend continued up to and including the eleventh end where at this stage Rathcoffey were holding the slender lead of one on a score of 9/8.

But from there it all went oh so wrong for them as St. Laurences seemed to find another gear and completely wiped out their opponents in those last four ends to unbelievably outscore the visitors with a whopping fourteen scores to nil and finished up winning by 21/9.

It is hard to comprehend what went wrong for Rathcoffey after playing and contributing to a fine game up to that point, maybe they just lost their concentration at this critical juncture in the game, who knows! We will leave that to them to answer.

St. Laurence’s: Kay Kirby, Paddy Keogh, Liam Kirby and Paddy Murphy.

Rathcoffey: Gerry McCann, Rita Campbell, John Tuite and Padraic Byrne.

St. Laurence’s only need three points from their remaining two games to ensure promotion to division 1 and on present form it is highly unlikely they will make any mistakes and accomplish that mission.

Rathcoffey will be disappointed with the result and will need to be in top form for their remaining two games against very tough opposition.

                                                 Recent League Results (home team first)

Div.1: Caragh 5 Ardclough 0.

Div.2: Rathcoffey 3, Rathangan 2; Prosperous 2, Blessington 3.

Div.3: Allenwood 0, Caragh 5; Donard/Glen 5, Naas 0.

Div. 4: Ardclough 5, Rathcoffey 0; Allen 3 Kilcullen 2.

Div. 5: Castlemitchell 5 Kildare 0.