La Ciotat triumph in annual town twinning competition

Eight teams representing the towns Bridgwater is either twinned or associated with competed for the 5th annual Town Twinning Petanque Competition held in Victoria Park on Friday 5th June.

For the first round the teams were divided into two leagues of four with each team playing every other team in their league.

By winning all three of their games the La Ciotat and Homberg teams topped their respective leagues and so progressed to play each other for the gold and silver medals.

By winning two of their matches Ukerske H and Marsa were second in their leagues so played off for the bronze medal.

Priverno and Bridgwater were third with one win each and as a result of failing to register a win Camarcha and Bridgewater (USA) were fourth and all these teams played off against each other for the minor places.

On a very blustery day and despite having to play on grass there was some very good petanque played and some very competitive and close fought matches. Although Marsa manged a comfortable win over Ukerske H (14-6) for the bronze medal place the match between La Ciotat and Homberg was a much closer encounter. With the scores level on six a piece the teams played a one end shoot out with La Ciotat just managing to come out on top and won the match 7-6.

The only "fannie" of the day occuured in the match for the wooden spoon with Camarcha defeating the Bridgewater USA team 13-0.

The final placing were:

1. La Ciotat
2. Homberg
3. Marsa
4. Ukerske H
5. Bridgwater
6. Priverno
7. Camarcha
8. Bridgewater (USA)

The Mayor, Kathy Pearce, helped draw the raffle before presenting the medals and wooden spoons to the winners and losers.

A big thank you to Bridgwater Town Council, both staff and councillors, for their help and support putting on the event and the staff of the Victoria Park Community Centre.. Also thank you to those who turned up as spectators, including our MP Ashley Fox. Thank you to the twinning groups who donated prizes for the raffle and finally thank you to all the members of the Bridgwater Petanque Club for helping both on the day and before by selling raffle tickets, preparing the terrain and by playing for the various teams taking part.

We now look forward to next year when hopefully we will have a purpose built terrain to play on.