Brave East Coast Veterans suffer Hickson Trophy semi-final loss against Leeds

In the semi-finals they faced Leeds, who beat West Riding and Huddersfield in the earlier rounds, at Wraggs.

East Coast got off to a decent start leading by 5, 78-73, after the first four games in spite of losing four of these.

The losers were Billy Holdsworth (Hunmanby) 21-20, Paul Morgan (Whitby) 21-18 and Geoff Oldham (Hunmanby 21-19. Kenny Wale (Whitby) won 21-10 to give East Coast the lead showing the value of losing players fighting for every point.

Unfortunately we lost three of the next four games as well, Jo Leeman (Whitby) 21-16, Gary Thornton (Borough) 21-14 and Geoff Watson (Whitby) 21-10, Ian Richardson providing the only consolation with a 21-17 win to make the score 139-153.

Barrie Watson (Borough) gave our team some hope with a 21-11 win and clubmate Dave Pryce only lost 21-20 to leave us just 5 points behind before a 21-10 loss for Harry Old (Hunmanby) and a 21-11 defeat for Nigel Trotter (North Cliff) sealed our fate by 227-201 after a valiant struggle against a strong team from Leeds.

In Division 2 of the Evening Singles League top of the table Eastfield A extended their winning run with a 150-106 (7-1) win at Bridlington Bay B.

In the Tuesday Division 1 table it is quite close at the top.

North Cliff head the list by 30 points having dropped only 4 points in a 164-125 (7-1) win at Borough B while second-placed Borough A lost a bit of ground with a 153-104 (5-3) win at Dukes Park A.

In the Thursday Evening League Borough A took some revenge on North Cliff A with a clean sweep home win, 84-54 to stand top of the table by 20 points although North Cliff have a match in hand.

In the Saturday Singles League North Cliff A top the Division 1 table by four points from Whitby after beating Dukes Park A 9-4 (192-166) at home while Whitby won 11-2 (198-137) at Hunmanby B.

In Division 2 Bridlington Bay A are 25 points clear at the top after winning 11-1 (205-149) at home to Robin Hood’s Bay.