IAN GREENWAY saved his best form until last to regain the Swan Studley Skittles League Singles Knockout Trophy.
After stuttering through the last 16 and eight stages, Greenway found a better rhythm and his score of 35 was enough to win the four-man final.
The last 16 stage featured two groups of eight skittlers competing for the top four places in each group to go through to the next round.
Group two was a low-scoring affair from which Greenway (Engineers), with a modest 28 pins, only progressed after a play-off against his team captain Andy Clewlow.
Others to go through were Gail Stringer (Team BG) scoring 36, Mark Ganderton (Engineers) with 34 and Rob Quartly (Jumbo Jet Set) with 32.
By contrast, group one had big scores of 40 from Craig Sears (Engineers), 39 each from Mac Eaton (Alcester Nomads) and Bob Haycock (Swan) and 38 from Glyn Morley (Lodge Farmers).
So good was the scoring in this group, that the lowest score – 30 pins by Margaret Povey (Alcester Nomads) – would have seen her qualify if she had been in group two.
The first of the two last eight groups of four skittlers had Morley in good form to qualify easily for the final with 38 pins.
The other person to reach the last from this group was Greenway with 32 but only after another play-off, this time pipping Quartly.
Meanwhile, in the other group, last year’s champion Ganderton easily made top spot by scoring 37, including a first leg stack of 14 pins, while Eaton, having scored only one pin in his first leg, recovered well to claim the other finalist spot with 31 pins.
Of the four skittlers contesting the latter stages, only Eaton had not been crowned singles champion before and he was to be denied even the runners-up medal this time, losing to Ganderton in yet another play-off.
Both Ganderton and Morley had scored well in all previous rounds and were perhaps favourites to win the singles trophy, but could not keep up with Ian Greenway who at last produced some solid bowling to score 35 and regain the title he last won in 2016.
