Matches shot on 4th January 2007.

Air gun shooters met last Thurs (4 Jan) after the Christmas and new year holidays, to compete in the abbreviated Webley Shield Competition. This year, teams will only shoot against each other once, with no return leg. Teams are handicapped by reference to their average league score for this season. The team with the highest
average being the scratch team. The difference between each team's average score in the 2006/07 season, rounded to the nearest whole number is added to the score of the team with the lowest average. In the event of a drawn match, the team with the lowest average is awarded the match.

League Champions Binton were at Home to RBL who could only field 6 shooters. Binton shot consistently well with only one 3 on the target all night. It seemed the norm for each of their shooters to get 3 bulls but half way through the match Andy Smith broke the mould when he shot 5 bulls to give him a score of 33 which equals his personal best this season. RBL were drifting further and further behind in this match until John Dencer took to the mark. It seemed as if he might get a possible until his 5th shot hit a 4, but his 34pts, equalling his personal best this season, clawed points back for RBL. Jan Dencer and Steve Ray also managed to pull one or two back for RBL to take the score to Binton 218 RBL 211 but with the handicap from Binton, RBL took the match with a total of 224pts.

The Wilmcote team, league runners up, visited MEB, bottom of the league, at Stratford Football Club. MEB who were struggling to field a team just before Christmas, must be favourites for the Shield with the return of Paul Clingan, at the end of November and Ray Warnock & Sheila Clarke last Thursday, both of whom have been absent for some weeks due to illness. Andy Morris, first up for Wilmcote shot a 4 then a string of bulls to score yet another 34pts. This was answered by Paul Clingan who shot his 3rd possible in only 4 appearances. Tom & Gareth Morris (Wilmcote) both shot 33pts and Ray Warnock shot 33. Jan Beattie (MEB) shot a personal best of 31pts. The teams seemed evenly matched with the score swinging first in favour of one team then the other. After 5 shooters Wilmcote had fallen behind by 4 pts but John Maycock's score of 33 evened the scores again, leaving it to the final shooters to decide the match. Fred Williams shot 31 but Wilmcote could only manage 29 which gave MEB victory over Wilmcote
without the need for the 15pt handicap. The final score was MEB 237 Wilmcote 220.

Avenue Sports & Social Club, (ASSC) who came 5th in the league competition, were given just 4 points by Home Guard (HG) who came 3rd , compared to HG's handicap last year of 15pts. Fran Westwood (ASSC) was first to shoot but she had difficulty finding the bull and shot 29. Richard Mills was first up for HG and shot a solid 31pts. Paul Nixon-Barron (ASSC) shot a personal best this year to get 31. HG's Colin Fulford pushed his team in front when he just missed out on a possible as his 3rd pellet hit a 4. Steve & Jo Everett (ASSC) kept up the pressure on HG when they each shot 30. Sam Goodman (HG) is developing into a very accurate and steady shooter, missing only 2 bulls to score 33, a personal best. He is showing all the signs of becoming the youngest marksman the league has seen for some years. Dee Green, ASSC team captain, who shot for only the fourth time this season, preferring to give younger members of the team opportunities to gain experience in competition shooting, scored a respectable 29pts but by then it seemed unlikely that HG would lose the match. They pipped ASSC by just 3pts to win the match 211 to 208pts.

Our website is up and running again having been successfully migrated so for more information, why not log on to www.sagl.co.uk or contact Roy Clarke on 01789 720340 or at his new e-mail address royclarke45@btinternet.com