FOURTH-placed Sharples C beat the side just a place above them in Bolton Badminton League's C Section, Moorside B, 11-7 in a clash that was close-fought to the end.

With the two teams having similar records, it was expected to be evenly-matched but the first set provided a comfortable win for Moorside.

Pam Leivesley and Andy Yates, Moorside’s first couple, opened the scoring with a 21-11, 21-15 win against Ailar Ashfari and Steve Duckworth.

The second set of mixed doubles was much closer as Moorside’s Pauline Charnock and Stuart Hall lost their first game 21-18 to Eileen Beeney and Nick Hitchen, Sharples’ first couple, before bouncing back to win the second 21-18.

A titanic tussle then took place when the third couples met with Moorside’s Laura Goff and David Gittins coming out on top, holding their nerve to win 22-20, 24-22 against Marion Anderson and Adrian Smith.

In the clash of the first couples, Sharples’ Beeney and Hitchen then claimed their games 21-16, 21-18, against Leivesley and Yates.

The last set of mixed doubles produced a shared result with Moorside’s Charnock and Hall taking the first 21-15, and Ashfari and Duckworth claiming the second 21-14.

Going into the level doubles, Moorside were 6-4 ahead and looking forward to taking the two points for a win and hold on to the third spot in the league.

Sharples, however, had other ideas.

In the first pair of ladies’ games, Anderson and Beeney proved too strong for Goff and Leivesley, winning 21-19, 21-11 to even the score.

This seemed to spur their team on and Smith and Hitchen claimed the first pair of men’s games comfortably, 21-14, 21-6, against Moorside’s Gittins and Yates.

It looked as though Sharples were on track for a clean sweep in the level doubles when Anderson and Ashfari won the first game 21-16 to put their team in a draw position, but Goff and Charnock hit back to give Moorside hope by claiming the second 21-11.

The result would all depend on the last pair of men’s games and Sharples’ Smith and Duckworth took the spoils, winning convincingly, 21-13, 21-11, against Gittins and Hall and completing a good team comeback.