Following on from their county final success, our Boccia team (Andrew Kyle, Samuel Kileen-McGuirk and Emily Kennon) got to test out their skills again on Wednesday at the Panathlon, North-West Regional Secondary Boccia Finals at Greenbank Sports Academy in Liverpool.
The huge sports hall was already full of teams playing warm up games when we arrived. There were 14 teams in all in our section of the competition and a similar number in the primary school competition taking place at the same time.
The 14 teams were divided into 4 pools and to progress through to the second round the team needed to top their pool. They did so with ease, winning 11 to 0, 17 to 0 and 10 to 0 against teams from Rossendale, Merseyside and Greater Manchester.
In the semi-final they met another Cumbrian team, Sandgate. Sandgate provided stronger competition, but our team continued to play confidently and won the match 4 points to 1.
The final was nail-biting! Ladybridge High from Greater Manchester won the first two ends and led 3 points to 0. In the third end, Willilam Howard scored 2 points and so going into the final end of the match, the score was 3-2 to Ladybridge High. Our team then managed to get one ball closest to the jack but with balls to spare realised that they if they played any further balls, they risked knocking the other team’s ball closer. Andrew, our captain, made the difficult decision to take the point and play a tie-break. In the tie-break, the jack ball was placed on a spot in the centre of the court and each player took it in turns to throw one ball to see who could get closest. Our team held their nerve and won.
Their coach, Mrs Croucher, said, “Huge congratulations to Andrew, Samuel and Emily, they all played some amazing shots over the course of the competition and worked really well together as a team. I’m grateful Panathlon for organising the event and for giving so many students the opportunity to have fun, shine and be successful.”
