Queen Street have won the HSBC Shield for the 2nd time in 3 seasons by beating St. Patrick's Blue by 15 shots in the final in St Matthew's Richhill. While the overall winning margin would seem to indicate a reasonably comfortable win for the Lurgan club, it was anything but, with over half that margin being gained in the last 2 ends on both second half mats.
Queen Street led from start to finish, but could not pull away from their Armagh opponents until those final 2 ends. Indeed at one point in the second half the difference was only 3 shots.
Queen Street started the contest as favourites, and gained the upper hand immediately on the first end with Trevor Hampton and Wendy Cassells lifting counts of 5 and 4 respectively. Trevor added another count of 5 on end 4 to lead 11-1 and it looked like Queen Street were going to run away with it. However the Armagh rink, skipped by Iggy Mallon, countered immediately with a 6 to tighten the match up again.
At the break Queen Street led by 7 and for the first few ends of the second half the difference hovered around this mark. However a count of 3 by Armagh's Briege Donnelly against Alan Cassells brought St. Pat's within striking distance, but with Alan Roberts getting the better of his Armagh opponents, this was as close as they got.
In the end Cassells picked up a 4 on the last end, while Roberts picked up a 3 and a 2 on his last 2 ends to leave a scoreline that maybe was a little harsh on St. Patrick's, but overall Queen Street deserved their win.
