Darlington bowlers are having an up and down season on many competitive fronts at local, regional and national levels.

Such is the good record over many years it seems that every bowler from every club is so keen and well prepared to meet and beat the Quaker bowlers, be it in competition which include Men, Lady or mixed players.

Seeking to match or even better the successes of last season, Darlington players, officials and supporters are enthusiastically seeking to turn out the best and really competitive teams enabling them to win against the best in the land. They hope to represent the Morrison Indoor Bowls Club in record breaking style. A tough challenge indeed for all concerned on and off the green in search of gold.

The Quakers 16-man team across four rinks playing on a home and away basis got off to a fine start in the All-England inter-club Denny Cup championship.

This prestigious championship is often referred to as the FA Cup event of bowls.

Darlington beat Tynedale of Hexham in the first round with Mick Tompkins, Nigel Evans and Brian Metcalf and skip Graham Peacock excelling themselves to enter the record books with an amzing 39-10 victory against the Ben Craig four.

Graham's rink was well supported by the rest of the team and went forward with lots of confidence this week to meet another Northumberland side from the Parks of North Shields.

The Tyneside club had recently recruited some very good players from the ailing Eldon Bowling Club in Newcastle whilst Darlington had themselves introduced some new players to their own team.

At home Ken Tinkler, Colin Young, Tony Bousfield and skip Andrew Kirtland raced into an early 7-2 lead over the first five ends.

The all round skill experience, discipline, flair, determination, rink spirit, consistency, application and keenness to win served them well on the Morrison Centre rink three.

After dropping a three at the sixth the Darlington bowlers went into top gear scoring two threes and a double to lead impressively and in real style by 14-8 at the half-way stage.

The best was still to come. Andrew took centre stage scoring four singles and a seven without reply to forge ahead with a convincing 25-9 lead at the 18th.

They scored two singles and a five to lead by 29-9 but unfortunately after dominating the game for three and a half hours they lost a vital four at the last and 21st end. However, they still beat Tom Birdsey, Mike Groundwater Alan Trinder and skip Paul Ging by 16 shots.

The newly formed and experienced rink including John Hills, Eric Ramsdale, Mark Jones and skip Allen Moore had a slow start drifting into a deficit of 2-7.

Darlington impressively secured the next 6 ends. The spoils were shared equally over the next five ends and they were all square on 9-9 going into the 15th end.

Darlington picked up a valuable and successive 1-1-2, whereas North Shields scored a 2-3 to edge into a lead of 14-13.

Disaster struck when unfortunately the Quakers 4 lost 7 shots on the 20th end and went down on rink four by 14-21.

Away from home the newly formed rink including Alan Lambert, as lead, Martin Lynch at number two with Ken Lamb in the experienced position of number three, skipped by John Lynch found if difficult to establish themselves losing three consecutive twos at the start.

The Quakers captured only two ends from the first ten and trailed 4-14 at the half way stage.

In a tight and demanding game against Gray Towns, Chris Boyle, Tom Wilson and skip Mike London, Darlington did well to finish adrift by 12-22.