COLIN WALKER has brought another major bowling honour back to the Lothians, claiming the World Indoor Bowls Council's Singles title at Swansea yesterday.
The likelihood of that happening had been on the cards from the opening day, with Midlothian-based Walker enjoying three wins in his section to qualify in pole position and unbeaten in his preliminaries. And he carried that fine form into the knock-
out quarter-final stage with a straight-sets 10-5, 10-4 win over the host nation's Dan Gough. That set the 32-year-old up for a head-to-head confrontation with East Lothian's Scott Kennedy, who beat him to the national singles title in January. However this time the Dalkeith-based player got his own back – but only just.
The odds were stacked against Walker in their semi-final clash when he lost the first set 2-10. But he got back on track in the second and it was neck and neck throughout the set with the result being decided on the last end where Walker counted a single to grab a lifeline after the score had been tied at 8-8.
The match was once again evenly poised at 1-1 in the best-of-three shoot out, but the Midlothian man took the vital count on the last to seal his place in the final.
His title decider against 18-year-old Garry Kelly from Ballymoney in Northern Ireland followed a similar pattern, Walker dropping the first set 5-11 with an end to spare.
In the second he clawed his way back from 6-2 down after five ends and found himself facing the same scenario as he had in his quarter-final match – going into the deciding end of the last set sharing the spoils at 8-8, where the shot would have given Kelly the title.
Once again Walker pulled victory from the jaws of defeat, and with that scare behind him he made no more mistakes, taking the title in two ends of the tie-break to bring the title back to Scotland for the first time since Darren Burnett's win in 2001.
"I'm just delighted to come out of this event with the title," said Walker later.
"I dug myself out of a hole – two holes in fact. I was out of the equation in both my semi-final and final and am relieved to have come good in the end.
"I didn't play as well today as I had played in the earlier rounds. I didn't feel that the bowls were finishing as well as they had been. The carpet was a bit sluggish."
First to congratulate the new champion was Kennedy, who lightened the moment and jokingly announced to all: "He must be the ugliest world champion ever!"
The Scots failed to make it a double singles celebration when defending champion Claire Johnston from Auchinleck lost her title to City of Ely's Sarah Seymour. She won the opening set 9-6, but dropped the second and the tie-break 9-4, 2-0. Seymour also ended the run of West Lothian's Wendy Archer at the quarter-final stage 12-6, 10-6.
Walker and Johnston were also pipped at the post in their Mixed Pairs semi-final clash by husband and wife duo Thomas and Lindsey Greechan from Jersey (9-4, 6-7, 2-0), who in turn lost the final to England's Suzanne and Mervyn King 9-7, 4-10, 2-0.
The full article contains 588 words and appears in Edinburgh Evening News newspaper.
