ROYAL Wootton Bassett’s foursome of Barry Sictorness, Terry Walton, Chris Cheesley and Mel Biggs (skip) missed out in their bid to add the British Isles senior fours championship title to the England title they won at last year’s national championships.

The Wiltshire quartet had beaten Jersey 20-18 with a double on the last end in the semi-finals to set up a senior fours final against Ireland at Leamington.

But the Bassett boys’ winning streak at Leamington ended as they suffered their first defeat in two seasons at the hands of the Irish team of Tommy Johnston, William Lennox, Eric Sands and Colin Hogg, who had beaten Scotland to progress from the other semi-final.

Bassett made a poor start to the contest against Ireland and never recovered, playing catch-up throughout.

Biggs’ rink never scored on the first five ends and were 8-0 down, and never really recovered from this big body blow.

They finally collected a single and a three to open their account and cut the deficit to 8-4 after seven ends, however, the gap had been extended to 13-4 after only 10 ends.

The Irish team continued to call the tune and had moved 17-7 clear of Bassett after 15 ends.

Biggs’ rink then made six unanswered shots to cut the gap to only 17-13 after 18 ends.

However, back came the Irish with a double to move 19-13 up and virtually seal the game at 19 ends.

The final two ends were shared, with Bassett and Ireland both scoring singles.