The 5th ladies ranking event took place in Breakers, Gorey, on Sunday 12th February. The draw uncannily panned out the same as the previous 4, with Treasa Keegan taking on Sandra Bryan. The recent selection of a new cue for Sandra did wonders for her, and she ran out the winner of this match by 3-1, to set herself up another semi-final face off with current number 2 Claire Mill. This was a fantastic match to watch, with nothing between both players, and it went all the way to the black ball in the final frame. Both players had a couple of shots at the black, but Claire took her 1st decent opportunity at a pot, to take the black and the match by 3-2. the other semi-final seen no. 1 Michelle Sherwin take on Michelle French once more. Michelle French had opportunities in all frames to win them, but the no. 1 held her nerve, took the important balls; and went on to win the match by 3-0. Claire got off to a great start in the final, with a 30 break right at the start of the frame; she went on to win this frame easily.
Claire should have taken the 2nd frame having been well ahead all the way through; but the frame turned on its head when Claire fouled on the brown; from there Michelle went on to take all the balls to clinch the frame on the black to make it 1-1. Michelle barely missed a ball in the next frame, and went on to easily win it. The 4th frame was much closer, and could have gone either way, but Michelle just about managed to win it and take the frame and match by 3-1, making it 5 wins out of 5 this season for her. The skills tournament was also a very toght affair, resulting in our 1st ever playoff in the skills, with Michelle French and Sandra Bryan tying on 69 points. Sandra proved best in the playoff and took her 3rd skills trophy of the season. Many thanks to Sandra and Murt for their kind hospitalty on the day.
