SATURDAY OCTOBER 22nd
The day dawned with fairly ordinary weather on this fourth Saturday of October and not much prospect of improvement. With a heavy cloud cover and forecast of possible showers and storms only eight bowlers had listed themselves for social bowls. The main event, however, was to be the quarter final clash of the Major Mens Fours. This match was started at 11am in an attempt to beat any late change in the conditions. As it happened, the rain held off and bowlers were able to get through the day unscathed.
MENS MAJOR FOURS QUARTER FINAL
With the Lewis and Wilson Greens still out of commission, this quarter final was allocated to the Waratah Green. Running at about 17, the green provided a fine surface for this important 21-end match.
These two highly ranked teams of Alastair McGhee, Carl Spilker, Nathan Boyers and skipper Mick Anderson, and Noel Fraser, Andy Connor, Jim Neely and skipper Dugald Braithwaite brought enough skill and experience to whet the appetite of any bowling fan. The match got away to a fairly even start with all bowlers seemingly in quite good touch. The teams shared the opening ends and team Braithwaite held a slender 5 – 3 lead after five ends. It was at this point however, that things swung in favour of team Anderson. Reaping a crucial five shots on the sixth, they then won the next five ends to establish a commanding lead of 14 – 5. Unfortunately for team Braithwaite, the second half of the game brought no greater fortune as Mick Anderson and his boys continued to grind their way through end after end. With two ends remaining, the lead to team Anderson was seven shots, and they closed out the game with two single shot ends. With a final score of 22 – 13 in their favour, and winning fourteen ends against seven, team Anderson was the superior four on the day.
Alastair McGhee led well all day! Noel Fraser also led well!
SOCIAL BOWLS
Because there were eight bowlers, two social games of pairs were set down on rinks 10 and 11 of the Waratah Green.
In the first of these games, Richard Denman and skipper Gordon Lewis went head to head with Arnold Lenczuk and Glenn Giese. And what an interesting game this turned out to be! With all bowlers in good touch, the two sides shared the opening ends for the score to be 6 – 6 after six ends. This evenness continued until Glenn and Arnold won five ends on the trot and pushed out to a five shot lead after fifteen ends. Far from done, Richard and Gordon fired in some excellent bowls to grab seven shots on the next two ends. With plenty of chat and good bowling the game was balanced on a knife edge at 16 – 16 with two ends remaining. But it was all over on the next end when the calm Richard and super-cool Gordon secured a massive five shots! The final score in their favour of 21 – 17 had them all smiles over drinks.
Super-cool Gordon Lewis! One-foot Arnie still gets one away!
In the second game, Graham Hartnup and skipper Don Coleman were up against Graham Denman and Terry Norwood. In this eighteen end match, team Coleman won the first three ends and, when leading 6 – 0, had their opposition more than a bit worried. However, team Norwood struck back immediately and had levelled the scores after six ends. They continued on their way and, after a run of four successive ends had set up a lead of 14 – 8 after eleven ends. With the two Grahams battling against each other as leads, and the skips adding their bit, the teams shared the final ends. The final score in favour of team Norwood was 20 – 14.
Graham Denman puts one down! Graham Hartnup rolled some good shots!
OTHER NEWS
The semi- finals of the Mens Major Fours Championship will be played in two weeks time on November 5th.