By Terry Shepherdson

NEW Earswick Indoor Bowls Club's Ospreys defeated Scarborough 79-76 in a very tight Over-55s Yorkshire League encounter.

Both sides won one rink at home and one away, with three of the four rinks being won by five points.

At Earswick, Gordon Johnson, Rodger Cann, Alwyn Anderson and Graham Lockwood, from being tied at 10-10 after 13 ends against J.Yeadon, P. Brooks, D. Crawley and B. Dickens, won the next seven ends before dropping a single at the last for a 22-17 win.

Graham Reid, Dave Crane, Bruce Dobson and Mick Head picked up a four at the ninth end to take the lead for the first time - going 9-7 ahead - against B. Storry, B. Colbourne, B. Truefitt and S. Taylor.They only scored one single at the next five ends, though, to fall 15-10 behind.

Reid's rink won four of the next five ends and again scored a four at the 18th to take an 18-17 lead into the last two ends but lost them both to go down 20-18.

Over on the east coast, Dave Sykes, Dave Hutchinson, Doug Carr and John Snowden recovered from being 10-2 down to S. Stamford, K. Eastwood, J, Punter and C. Turnbull after seven ends by scoring five twos at the next seven ends to narrow the gap to one shot at 13-12 down.

They went into the last end trailing 19-16 and were holding six shots until the Scarborough skip picked up the jack with his last wood to score two and win the rink 21-16.

The final rink turned out to be the game of the day with Pete Davison, Ian Carr, Vic Thompson and Nigel Steels always trailing P. McCuturn, M. Riley, P. Corbett and J. Buckle.

With the score at 18-9 to the home rink after 16 ends, the Ospreys picked up a single then a three, followed by a five and a four - and with a single at the last end, transformed a nine-shot deficit into a five-shot 23-18 win.