RIVERSIDE have two bowlers through to the area finals of the English Indoor BA national championships.

Simon Doig overcame fellow Riverside player Luke Young 21-10 to secure his place in the under-25 singles final, where he meets Craig Shepherd, the Dolphin mem-ber going through against Antony Nixon (Banister Park).

In the over-60s singles, Eric Bates produced a fine semi-final performance on the Riverside carpet at Winchester to beat former Dorset Middleton Cup bowler Ron Porter 21-12.

Bates now plays Ken Marsh (Banister Park), who qualified with a walk-over. Both area finals are to be played by December 31 - dates and venues to be decided.

Banister Park's Danny McEwan kept his cool to pip Hampshire Liberty Trophy player Bill Belcher 21-20 in the third round of the senior men's singles.

McEwan, 6-4 down at five ends, sensed victory at 20-13 until losing four consecutive ends which levelled the game but he regained control just in time to find the winning shot.

McEwan next plays Belcher's East Dorset clubmate Chris Martin, who knocked out Brian Shepherd (Dolphin) 21-16.

Another Banister member still going strong is Barry Bendall, who halted Mike Crook (Five Rivers) 21-17, but three other representatives of the Eastleigh club went out, Roy Alford 21-17 to Roy Skipp (Atherley), Geoff Norgate 21-18 to Chris Macmillan (East Dorset) and Nixon 21-7 to Willie McCay (Atherley).

Atherley international Peter Ward, a national quarter-finalist last season, beat "Sticky" Bostock (Longmeadow) 21-13, but out went Longmeadow's former national singles king, Andy Ross, 21-15 at the hands of fellow Liberty Trophy player Chris Daniels (Bournemouth).

Atherley came off second best in two tussles with East Dorset, Dennis Durrant falling 21-10 to Nicky Smith and Dave Bishop going out 21-19 to Terry Chivers after being 17-7 adrift.

Victory sailed through to the next round of the Canada Life Denny Plate 87-57 against Worthing Field Place.

The Portsmouth club won all four rinks thanks to Ian Mackenzie (22-10 against Chris Young) and Peter Hobday (21-15 against Mike Howard) at home and Adrian Ash (20-13 against John Dicker) and Colin Hayward (24-19 against Brian Dunne) in Sussex.