Honiton petanque faced two matches on their visit to North Devon, but it proved to be disappointing away day for the Mountbatten Park boulers with two defeats, and sees them drop to fifth in the Devon League.

The team for both matches was the same; Chris Bigmore, Charlie O’Reilly, Larry Halliwell, Jenny Lavender, Tony Prior and Cecily Young and they travelled hopeful of repeating the results from the reverse fixtures three weeks ago, when they recorded two home wins against Pig On The Hill (Westward Ho!) 3-2 and Torridge U3A 4-1.

This time, the results were reversed with losses of 3-2 at the POTH and 5-0 at Torridge. The only scorers of the day, gained in the first match, were the triple of Halliwell, Prior and Young followed by a win again in the doubles for Halliwell and Young, so earning two valuable points for the team.

“We try not to make excuses, but they were both very tricky terrains, new to half of our team,” said Captain Chris Bigmore.

He continued: “We went hoping to gain maybe four or five points, so we were a bit deflated, but that just shows the progress we are making this season and as I have said before we remain on target and positive.”

Three of Honiton’s remaining four matches this season are at home, and next up they face a tough match when they entertain Plymouth, the only unbeaten side in the league.