Kildare West Wicklow bowls tournament in Hollywood a shining success

The Hollywood 2025 annual indoor bowling tournament by the Kildare West Wicklow Indoor Bowling Association commenced on Tuesday, October 28 and continued to Saturday, November 1 in the Hollywood Community Hall and in the Hollywood National school.

This popular tournament was well supported throughout the week with a large attendance every night. There was some very good matches and close results in most games with some surprises also.

In the first Cup semi-final Donard/Glen just edged out a Rathcoffey team by a slender margin, while in the second Cup semi-final Baltinglass/Kiltegan saw off the challenge of a very game and surprise semi-finalist Hollywood team.

In the Shield semi-finals Rathmore accounted for a very strong Kildare town side, while Monread defeated a fancied Ardclough team.

Cup Final
This was a contest between the two West Wicklow teams Baltinglass/ Kiltegan and Donard/ Glen.
This was expected to be a close and exciting match between those rivals as both teams produced great performances throughout the tournament. From the off it was Baltinglass/ Kiltegan that were on the front foot and adding score after score. Donard/ Glen just didn’t get any sort of rhythm going.

A sudden loss of form against a classy outfit like Balinglass/ Kiltegan was always going to have only one result, meaning a comprehensive victory for their opponents. Albeit Donard/Glen were very unlucky on a number of occasions, there is no doubting that Baltinglass/ Kiltegan deserved their victory.

Baltinglass/ Kiltegan: Andy Owens, Aengus McDonagh, John Kehoe, Edward Lawrence.

Donard/Glen: Amy Butler, Paddy Kavanagh, Alan McEvoy, Paul Barrett.

Shield Final
Rathmore v Monread. If the Cup final was a disappointment this match made up for it.
It was a thrilling game from the start to the finish. There was very little between either side at any time during the game, in fact they were level a couple of times.

Rathmore being the more experienced team would have been the favourites in most peoples eyes, but Monread who were the surprise package to reach this final produced a superb performance to defeat such a strong Rathmore team.

Monread: Olive O’Neill, Sheila Brien, Valorie Halford, Frank Connolly.
Rathmore: Tom Ryan, Bríd Dungan, Frank Feane, Breda Fenner.

The presentations were made by the family of the late Peter Byrne, son Declan, daughters Linda and Carol, granddaughter Isobel was also in attendance.

A word of thanks to the organisers, caterers, raffle ticket sellers etc. of the Hollywood club for the hard work behind the scenes to make it such a success.

A special thank you to the school principal and teachers for the use of the school during the mid-term break, for without this facility it would be impossible to run this competition in such a short space of time. This was, and is community spirit at its best.

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