PENNANTS BOWLS SATURDAY MAY 10th (Terry Norwood reporting)
Saturday saw the conclusion of the Grade Two Pennants competition when Bowral played host to the team from Penrith. This was a catch-up match for the game which had been postponed due to rain on April 29th. Unfortunately for the Bowral team, Penrith, the competition leaders, were far too good on the day and took all 10 points from the encounter. This meant that Penrith won the Grade Two competition and congratulations go to them. The result from this match also meant that Bowral remained on the bottom of the ladder in fifth position; food for thought about next season.
In the first of Saturday’s games on rink 8, Bowral was represented by the four of Gordon Lewis, Al McGhee, Mick Armstrong and Mick Spong. Bowral got on the score-card early and were level with Penrith after three ends. However, by the tenth end, Penrith had extended the lead to 12 – 5 and didn’t look back from there. In all, Penrith won thirteen ends and had a comfortable victory at 25 – 11.
On rink 9, the Bowral four was Terry Butt, Scott Kennon, Carl Spilker and Nathan Boyers. Right from the start, the Penrith side was in very hot form winning nine of the first ten ends. With the score 19 – 1, the Bowral side was really under the pump and feeling the pressure. To their credit, the Bowral boys won seven of the remaining ends, but, unfortunately, were unable to reduce the margin. The final score in favour of Penrith was 28 – 10.
In the final game on rink 10, the Bowral four was Terry Norwood, Jim Neely, Stephen Della and skipper Kevin Stafford. Similar to the other two games, Penrith made the better start and raced to a lead of 16 – 4 after ten ends. At that point, the Bowral boys staged a comeback and with Jim, Stephen and Kevin all firing won the next six ends. The comeback continued over the next few ends for the scores to be locked at 18 all with one end to play. On the final end when down two shots, the Penrith skipper pulled off two excellent drives to win the game 20 – 18 for Penrith.