An Isle of Man, Men's warm up match took place between the NI Specials (bottom), and the NI B2s Team (top) on Sunday 28th June. The venue was Ballymena United FCSC. B2s Captain Derek Whiteside told his players to underestimate their opponents at their peril. But even his stern team talk couldn't stop the Specials racing into a deserved 6-1 lead. The B2s then rallied to reduce the deficit to 7-4 at the end of the first session. The next 6 frames were shared, as the Specials led 10-7 at the midway point in the match, but 5 in a row seen the B2s lead 12-10 going into the Final session. Unfortunately for the Specials, they couldn't keep up the good form of the first 2 sessions. But even though the 11-1 scoreline in the final session, sounds like a rout, the true story is that several of the frames were won on the black ball for the B2s. The final score was 23-11 to Derek Whiteside's B2s.Best performers for his team were Tom McCorry, Peter Leddy, Trevor Whiteside and Ady Toner all with 3 wins from 3 frames. Best for the Specials were John Brown, Alan Bell and Trevor Mulholland all with 2 wins from 3 frames. All in all it was a worthy excercise giving both teams valuable matchplay and for the Specials more experience at the full Blackball Rules.
