BCGBA Senior Merit Finals Day Special

Bowling News

The 2025 BCGBA Senior Individual Merit (known as the All-England) will be held at Dodworth Miners Welfare on Saturday 26 July. Plenty of local bowlers feature among the 64 qualifiers. The full opening round draw has been made and is presented further down this page along with the betting odds on all 64 bowlers but first we have a Dave Parkin Special.

Dave has produced an introduction to the eight Yorkshire bowlers through to the Last 64.

On Saturday at Dodworth Miners Welfare near Barnsley, 8 bowlers representing Yorkshire will attempt to bring the title back to Yorkshire for the 17^th time.

Here is a preview of the eight Yorkshire qualifiers.

Johnny Wood: Member of the all-conquering Crossgates team who are BCGBA & British Parks team champions & reigning Mirfield League champions. Johnny is unbeaten from debut for Yorkshire & got his place by losing in the Quarter Final at Guisley to runner-up, Stuart King.

Stuart King: Stuart is in cracking form having just fallen short last weekend as losing finalist in the Mirfield Merit. The Pudsey man has also picked up 2 Open titles in the last 12 months. Last October, he won the Linthwaite Hall Classic and in June, took home the Walsden Classic title too. These qualified him for the Champion of Champions at Owley Wood in September.

Nathan Dobson: Nathan will join Stuart at Owley Wood as he was the inaugural winner of the Cowcliffe Classic in May. He went on to make a winning Yorkshire County debut in June. The Littlemoor star will have his supporters on Saturday.

Gareth Coates: Gareth needs little introduction & the Akroydon Vic man is probably the County’s best bowler on the Open circuit in recent years. He’s won the Yorkshire Merit, Autumn Waterloo, September IOM & Hillcrest over the last few years. He lost out in a thriller to eventual winner, Steve Gilroy in the semi-finals of the Mirfield Merit & last April, he won the Marina Fisheries one-day 64 at Fleetwood to book his place at Owley Wood.

Dave Cowsill: Dave takes his place in the field as the “best loser” from the Last 16 round in the Yorkshire Merit as 3-time winner, James Hanson is unavailable. Dave has plenty of experience in local merits as a 5-time Wakefield Merit winner. The Alverthorpe vet will not be making the short trip down the M1 to make up the numbers

Josh Brown: Josh had a great 2024 taking down the Marsh & Sandal titles before losing to eventual winner, Paul Dudley at Owley Wood. The Yorkshire County man will be hoping to go deep on Saturday where he will have support from his many teammates from Kirkheaton Con, Crosland Moor & Skelmanthorpe Windmill plus the Griffin.

Kez Smith: The Crossgates & County man has plenty of experience & took down Callum Wraight in the 2016 June IOM final so won’t be daunted by the task ahead on Saturday.

Jack Bowes: 1^st season Pudsey man, Jack Bowes, another County player has played well this season after transferring from Littlemoor. He was overwhelmed by Stuart King in the Yorkshire Merit semi-finals but had taken the scalp of Josh Brown in the quarters. He’ll be back at Dodworth no doubt on Tuesday when Pudsey visit in the Mirfield league.

Thongsbridge members Mark Booth & Ross Meese are also in the field qualifying through the South Yorkshire Merit. Ross is bang in form as he took home the Federation Merit title on Sunday which was played at Owley Wood and also won the Brian Reed Memorial at Dodworth earlier this year. One to watch for sure. Mark will be hungry to keep the title in South Yorkshire and will know the green well.

Dave Parkin offers his tips for the title and section winners with the straight win odds produced below.

The way the draw is set up is to avoid same county clashes until the quarter finals, Yorkshire could have all the 8 quarter-finalists!.

Favourites to win 3 of the quarters (Wood, King & Coates)

Kez Smith @ 40’s would be my bet for the other quarter Ben Gloag (Greater Manchester) @ 50’s may go well in that part of the draw

Odds from Duncan Reeves & Graham Hirst

We will be betting on players to qualify for the last 8 & these odds will be published on Friday. Heats from the last 16 onwards will be available on the day.