A MIXED week for Cowdenbeath Bowling Club with the League Cup defence, having won it last year, not going to plan at Dunfermline Northern green in the quarter final, writes Jack High.

The green played at a decent pace but there were some tricky roads and home advantage certainly paid off.

Eric McMillan, Alan Moncur, Lindsay Black and Andy Johnstone got off to a good start and managed to beat Daniel Martin's rink by four shots.

It was close on the other two rinks till about 11 ends. Mitch Drysdale, Rab Thomson, Peter Graham and Robert McFarlane were eventually well beaten by Connor Fulton's rink and Billy Allan, Wullie Wightman, Derek Easson and Glen Livingston lost to Ian McLean's rink.

Dunfermline Northern progressed 5-2 on points. They play Dalgety Bay (who beat Inverkeithing) in the semi-final with Abbeyview (beating Kelty) at home to Headwell (who beat Kinghorn) in the other. All four games were won by the home teams 5-2.

Hat night winners were Willie McLean, Brian Miller and Eddie Hastie. Eddie is closing in on league leader Jim Watson with a few weeks to go.

Billy Allan, Roy Lawson, Lindsay Black and Derek Easson played the quarter final of the 'William Babbs' on Tuesday at Dunfermline West End against Eddie Cathcart's rink from Headwell.

After two ends the score was 6-6 with Cowdenbeath losing a six when Eddie lifted a bowl for a count then missing the next end when Cowdenbeath had six close. Derek played particularly well at some points and they ran out 21-13 winners and progressed to the semi-final where they play Tom Hutchison's rink from Abbeyview (who got a walk over when Lochgelly did not turn up for the quarter-final) in a repeat of last year's final.

That is at Crossgates on Tuesday with Dunfermline Northern playing another Headwell team in the other half.

The recent three counties competition results were received and Arbroath Newgate won with 6 points and plus 55 shots and 41 ends won. Cowdenbeath also had 6 points and plus 55 shots but only won 38 ends. The annoying part was that one of the Cowdenbeath rinks only managed to play 16 ends... Another hard lines story.

On Friday afternoon Cowdenbeath played Lochgelly at Dunfermline green in the 'Peter Colman' West Fife Bowling Association Senior Top Nine competition final.

Bobby Reekie and Rab Thomson played the formidable pair of Alan Bowers and Alan Scott. Some excellent bowls were played by all four, but particularly in the second half of the game by Alan Bowers who peppered the jack.

Cowdenbeath could have lost by a lot more but some excellent bowls kept the score tight.

It was level at 7-7 but Lochgelly went on to win 15-7.

The rink of John Allan, Jim Watson, Eddie Hastie and Lindsay Black all played well and always had bowls in the head.

They got a couple of good breaks but deservedly won 28-6 against Tom Muir's rink.

This meant the triples of Cowdenbeath could afford a draw as Cowdenbeath were well ahead on shots. It was all down to the triples of Billy Allan, Eric McMillan and Derek Easson who were up against Mick Connolly's team. It was level nearly every other end in a low scoring game. With two to play and the other two games finished Lochgelly were 10-9 up.

They were lying a couple and Eric McMillan found a tight line to draw the shot about 8 inches away jack high. Mick failed to alter the head and lost a shot despite having about five second shots.

Level playing the last with winner takes all. Billy Allan had a couple of bowls about 8" short and Roy Fox played a bit heavy and chipped a high bowl into the head 6" behind the jack. Eric McMillan then played over the draw to sit Billy's front bowl down to lie the shot.

Derek Easson then played positional bowls including a very good blocker and Mick failed to change the head again so Cowdenbeath won the triples 11-10 to win 4-2 on points and by 15 shots.