FIVE Warrington pool players helped the Cheshire A team win a national championship against the odds.

Anton Evans, Louis Davies, Paul Spencer, Gaz Owen and chairman John Barton, who all play in the Warrington Independent Pool League, caused an upset in winning the Blackball Pool National Championships in Selsey, West Sussex.

Five members of the county B team, who had not reached the finals after the eight-month qualifying league, made their mark as replacements for unavailable regulars as Cheshire stunned a competition featuring professional players by returning north with the silverware.

Barton said: "I'm so proud of my lads. The young guns stepped up to the plate and it goes to show what can be achieved with teamwork and a very solid bond which showed in every match."

Around 2,000 watched on YouTube as Cheshire took the title against Warwickshire, who had beaten Cheshire 14-10 in the group section on the first of four days of cue action.

Also in the successful Cheshire team were Team Riley's Manchester trio Mark Beeson, Jason King and Nick Powell along with Sandbach's Gaz Hibbott, the 2016 world champion, while it was Fisher, Evans, Davies, Spencer and Beeson who had been drafted in from the B team.

Together they 'pretty much went down to make the numbers up in the A competition' with higher hopes in the seniors competition, in which they bowed out in the quarter finals.

But they got off to a bright start with a 14-13 deciding frame win against one of the pre-tournament favorites and perennial finalists, West Yorkshire.

Although they lost day one's second game against Warwickshire there were two wins courtesy of last-frame deciders against Essex and Bristol on day two, along with victories over Berkshire 14-9 and Lancashire 14-11.

A 14-6 hammering at the hands of competition favourites Teeside was in effect a dead-rubber as Cheshire had already qualified for the quarter finals, a stage they had only reached once before in the team's seven-year history.

With their best performance so far they knocked out fellow north west qualifiers Merseyside, who they had not beaten before, with a 14-12 score to reach the last four.

There they overcame Staffordshire, who had knocked out Teeside in the quarter finals, after fighting back from 12-7 and 13-10 adrift.

Staring defeat in the face, they reeled off the last four frames to win 14-13 amid chaotic scenes.

All of the players' friends and family were watching the live stream back home as they got off to a dreadful start in the final against Warwickshire, going behind 5-1.

However, they wrestled back the momentum, took the next seven frames to lead 8-5 and held off a late comeback with the youngest member of team, Davies, producing 'an amazing clearance' under immense pressure to secure the title.

Team member Russ Fisher summed up the success: "We somehow managed to beat all the professional pool players from around the country to win the title. It was proper David and Goliath stuff."

And stand-in captain David McNamara, who won the under 23s world and national titles last year, added: "It's crazy winning the biggest team event in Blackball with a bunch of close friends who shouldn't have stood a chance.

"The feeling when we got over the line was a bigger buzz than winning the singles last year. Things like this don't happen to little old Cheshire, it's up there with Leicester winning the Prem, Trump and Brexit."

n Anyone interested in playing for Cheshire should go along to the 147 Club, Evans House, Norman Street, Warrington, on Sunday at noon for trials or pop in anytime and ask to be put in touch with the team officials.