Juniors put on Balmoral show

BALLYMENA Juniors entertained Balmoral in the IBA Junior Cup last Saturday and scored a comfortable 98-69 victory to progress in to the next round.

Alistair Coleman, Stephen Coleman, Ivan Lynn and John Coulter took control of their game right from the start on rink 1.

Four counts of 3 shots between the fifth and ninth ends saw the Braid quartet establish an 11 shot lead and while the rest of the game was closer, it was Coulter's men who finished 28 shots to 15 ahead.

The Ballymena rink of Michael Wilson, John McFall, Danny McCullough and Andrew Armstrong could not repeat the good 'Old Bleach' performance from the previous Tuesday night.

The Balmoral rink which was skipped by R Girvan held a slender one shot lead after 5 ends, however they scored heavily over the next 9 ends to open up a 17 shot lead and that was still the margin at the end of the game as the visitors scored a 31-14 victory.

The very experienced rink of Alan McAuley, Allen Stewart, J J Robinson and Jimmy Larkin opened up a 9 shot lead after only 6 ends against J Kane, but ten ends later the Balmoral rink had reduced the deficit to only 2 shots.

Larkin's men however found an extra gear over the last 5 ends scoring 14 unanswered shots to claim victory by 27 shots to 12.

There was another dominant performance on rink 4 where Billy McCandless, Joe McKeown, Nigel McAleese and Roy Torrington took on R Adair.

The visitors could only score three singles over the first 11 ends as the Ballymena men opened up a 14 shot lead and even though the remainder of the game was closer, it was the Braid quartet who ran out victors by 29 shots to 11.

Tonight (Tuesday), the Juniors entertain Ulster Transport in the NIPGL Junior League Division 1 and also on Saturday they host Falls. In between this they play Belmont at home in the second round of the NIPGL Junior Cup.

Related topics: