Jane Powell wins Bath B-Level (3+) Series tournament (8 July)
[<<] [>>] by Paul Francis
at Bath
12th July 2021
(GC)
After opening with two tense 7 - 6 wins in the block stage of the tournament, Jane Powell's metronomic hoop running powered her to the final with two more comfortable wins.
In the meantime, the tournament's highest ranked player, Stephen Pearson, looked in good form with two comfortable opening wins.
However, a defeat to Raghu Iyer in the final block match threatened Stephen's route to the semi-final but he progressed through via a better net hoop score in his three games.
Stephen's good form was restored in the semi-final when he swept aside the impressive Stephen Hayns 7 - 2.
Unfortunately, for Stephen, he was unable to match the 'Powell hoop running machine' in the final and Jane recorded a comfortable 7 - 4 win.
Third place went to Stephen Hayns with victory over Patrick Knight who, throughout the block stage, defied his ranking position with a series of impressive jump shots.
Despite this margin of victory in the final, 25% of the games in the tournament went to 7 - 6 and 40% of games went to a two-oop margin or less.