LINNEY's bowlers have retained the Flowfit Ludlow League's Knock-out Cup after beating Cleobury on a successful finals day at Burway.

Mal Bowen, Graham Lane, Roy Harris and Sarah Desborough all secured wins for Linney to ensure the team won 181-168 after having a +15 head-start.

Linney captain Ian Jackson was presented with the trophy by league chairman Lillian Payne.

The competition is run through a handicap system based on the previous season's result and the finals day uses games plated between the teams this campaign/

Linney had a 66-shot advantage against Ludlow Castle in the semi-finals, which looked under threat following singles wins for Castle's Richard Lane, Nicky Beard, Dave Wilding and the returning Harry Harrington.

Linney's Graham Lane then offered some resistance by winning 21-7, which proved vital because, despite Mal Griffiths carding a brilliant 21-7 for Castle, Linney edged the victory by six shots.

The second semi-final saw Stokesay have a 68-shot lead going into the game against Cleobury.

They started well with Ryan Wilding bowling brilliantly to win 21-9.

Cleobury stuck at it though and single figure wins for Jamie Taylor, Roy Andrews and Phil Pack were pivotal as they were two shots down going into the final game.

Andy Pain then beat Phil Good 2-13 to give Cleobury a six-shot victory.

Linney were quickly out of the blocks in the final and won three out of their opening four games.

Cleobury came strong in the middle with Paul Lill and Michael Hutchinson securing wins to give them a great chance of overturning the handicap.

But Linney proved how strong their back four are and they only dropped four shots at the end to ensure a 13-shot victory.

"The committee would like to thank all teams for playing the games in the right spirit and for all the supporters who came to support the day," said league secretary Steve Burmingham.