Update 25^th March 2014.

Congratulations to Northern’s Woman’s second division interclub team in defending their New Zealand title. For the second time are New Zealand Champions. 

Commiserations to the Division A men’s team who finished a very close and very creditable second.

Comment on Bowls   by Denis Duffy.

Manawatu results at last weekend’s National Interclub finals amounted to a pretty solid follow-up to the recent successes in the Hexagonal competition. The Northern men couldn’t have gone closer to pulling off the big one with it all coming down to the last minute action witnessed by the crowd around the Palmerston North back green. They were watching Terry Johnson come agonisingly close to nailing the win over former BlackJack Jamie Hill that would have clinched the title for Northern. Terry forced a draw in his usual deliberate and unflappable style, but unfortunately a win was required to deny the popular winners from Alexandra in the far South. Meanwhile, at Northern, the local Women’s side were adding another credit to their long list of achievements by winning the B Grade Women’s title. Next weekend sees the culmination of the representative season with our Men’s and Women’s sides looking well prepared to pursue their respective National Inter-Centre titles. This event invites entries from all Centres, so no-one has pre-qualified and no-one has been eliminated, thus making form on the day and over the crucial weekend all-important.

As a former selector, I know only too well that picking the Masters team each year is a real challenge and the teams selected are often contentious. This is because the over 60 age-group for both Men and Women is an area where often the best players don’t necessarily overshadow the others, and there is considerable depth of worthy contenders. These players aren’t necessarily top performers in Centre events, and then the selector has to be aware of new arrivals into this more venerable age-group. This year Neil Gordon was such a player, and eagle-eyed Selector Terry Puklowski was able use him well as Skip of the Triples. Both Men’s and Women’s teams finished runners-up in their respective tournaments ,which is a very creditable result. Wellington and Hutt Valley field separate sides in these much anticipated events, and I know that Taranaki, Hawkes Bay and Gisborne-East Coast remain disappointed that they don’t have a starter’s spot in these events or an equivalent tournament locally.  Our runner-up results were both very much a solid team performance with outstanding contributions coming from Singles player Bev Budd for the Women and the Eric Watson/Ron Henn Pair for the Men. Eric has a long and distinguished record in this event, as has Brian Henn, who took on the challenging  Singles berth this time.

For a club to reach 125 years of existence while still strong and in good heart is a worthy achievement, and this impressive milestone has just been marked by our oldest club in Palmerston North. Neil Richardson mentioned at the excellent dinner which marked the occasion that the club has always excelled in the three key areas of quality greens, quality administration and quality competition for those so inclined, and this is very true. I know that I’m proud to be a member of this outstanding club because the really important things are always done and done well. This was exemplified by the way in which longest serving members and Life Members were paid due respect at the dinner. Bruce Heaphy is currently the longest playing member, and it was remarkable to hear him recall playing a casual game on the club greens in far-off days as a mere youth when the greens were located elsewhere in town. This game occurred in 1950, before even Centre President Phil, who was in attendance, might have sneaked in for a game at Northern when the older members weren’t looking. It’s worth recalling that in those days younger players were strongly frowned upon, with many clubs refusing members under the age of thirty.

Full marks to Philip Skoglund for his wonderful initiative in organising the centre’s first fast Fives tournament last week. This is a format that clearly satisfies the often stated need to speed the game up, and what we saw of it on TV late last year was genuinely exciting. I’m sure we’ll see more fast Fives next season, but the real challenge is to somehow encourage this sort of thing without alienating the traditional players who enjoy the longer formats. The ongoing pre-eminence of the Taranaki Open Fours is sufficient evidence of that!

Final mention must go to Barry Wynks and Mark Noble, who by all accounts performed well enough in Melbourne recently to make it clear they will be genuine medal contenders at Glasgow later in the year. This is no surprise in the Manawatu, and it was great to see Mark making a huge contribution to his Club’s fine performance last weekend, thereby overcoming the obvious difficulties of switching between greens in different countries and running at dramatically differing speeds.

Denis Duffy

Thanks Denis.

Update 11^th March 2014.

Comment on Bowls   by Denis Duffy.

The Bowls Napier greens are the scene this week of six consecutive days of regional eliminations under the ‘pathways’ concept. At time of writing, Manawatu has already had significant success. The top Men’s Interclub side from Northern and the ‘B Grade’ Women’s team from the same club both earned a spot in the National Interclub  finals weekend to be held in Palmerston North later this month. A journey to the deep South awaits Pat Horgan’s  Palmerston North Men’s Four who will try for a National Club title at the Dunedin indoor complex in June. Further aspirants for Dunedin will hopefully emerge as the week progresses. While congratulating our successful players, several background aspects of the competition are points of discussion. Firstly, our ‘pathways’ players will face major hurdles to surmount in their pursuit of national glory because match play on artificial indoor surfaces is not available locally.  The Heretaunga complex in Hastings the only one that is not located far from the Manawatu. It’s also acknowledged that the region in which Manawatu competes is not one of New Zealand’s strongest, meaning that most of their opponents will have battled through a potentially tougher field to earn their place. The ‘pathways’ concept was designed to give all players the chance to play their way to a national title without the expense of attending the traditional Nationals held in the post-Christmas period. It’s not quite that simple though, with endless debate about the costs of this system and consequently the best dates and venues to use from an economical point of view. Long gone are the halcyon days when money was poured liberally into the sport by a certain cigarette company, whose representatives would even dispense their product cost- free around the greens during top competition! The status of the ultimate champions is also under debate. From the outset, winners have earned a full national title and a point towards a potential Gold Star, but Gary Lawson and others have championed the argument that ‘pathways’ titles should not be recognised equally with the traditional tournament ones. Putting all that aside, local bowlers will be right behind our representatives who, in the Horgan team’s case anyway, sneaked through on countback by the narrowest of margins. This is not uncommon where only four teams are involved in a cut-throat competition which almost requires a mathematician on the bank to keep up with the constantly changing match differentials that often make all the difference at the end.

There was also a need for accurate maths last week in the engine room of the Palmerston North club’s 30th Golden Oldies tournament. In this case though, Centre Secretary Vern Sixtus and his trusty laptop computer ensured that results were dealt with accurately and speedily. There was a suggestion at one point that a certain former national president who was officiating at the Terrace End greens may have made an error! A speedy return journey to headquarters to locate the relevant scorecard proved that the error in fact lay with the skips, who had signed a card showing the reverse of the correct result. This incident underlined the responsibility of the players to keep accurate records in an event where often only the finest of margins separate the competitors and thus can make the difference when it comes to the prize money. This tournament is the biggest run by a club in the country, proving that there must be several keys to its ongoing success. One is the distribution of prize money, which is well stratified, avoiding the temptation to put too much emphasis on a large purse for the ‘A’ Section. Levin’s Ian Mahoney played impressively to wrap up his second title in three years, this time with a radically altered team featuring the addition of two former Manawatu players in David Walker and ‘the Lizard’, a.k.a. Trevor Tuatara.

Denis Duffy

Thanks Denis.

Update 3^rd March  2014.

Our Annual Hospice tournament was once again a great success thanks to Barry and his team of helpers.

I am looking forward to hearing how much Barry has made for the Hospice this year.

Well done everyone.

The weather was great and everyone joined in to the spirit of the day and from my observations, had a ball.

Brian Looker’s team was the winner of the tournament. They were the defending champions.

Here are some pictures taken on the day. If you click on them, it should make them bigger. If there are any there you would like a copy of, let me know.

(Comment on Bowls by Denis Duffy for this week will follow the Hospice pictures.)

Comment on Bowls by Denis Duffy.

Some of the Centre’s smaller clubs have been taking the chance to shine recently, which is always good to see. The Champion of Champions event for  Over 65 Pairs was recently hosted by Ashhurst, and it wasn’t long before, as a well known former Radio Sport commentator used to say, there was ‘carnage on the greens’.  The larger and more favoured clubs quickly fell by the wayside, with The locals, skipped by Centre Vice-President Tony Woodley, disposing of the strong Palmerston North and Terrace End outfits outfits skipped by Eric Watson and Graeme Gosnell respectively. . ‘Woody’ fell in the the semi-finals, and the final was won comfortably by Shannon skip Graeme Woodmass, with the well performed Lyn Metcalfe leading. Shannon also made its mark in recent weeks when Dean Whiti reached the Senior Men’s Champion Singles final, only to go down to Darryl Johnson. The final between frontier clubs Shannon and Himatangi Beach in that prestigious event was probably unprecedented.

Across the ranges, Les Webster led the successful staging of a tournament supporting the Relay for Life charity at Woodville, a highly successful occasion that attracted an entry from as far north as Waipawa.

The major fixture of last weekend though was Barry Gush’s iconic Hospice Tournament at the Northern greens. The tally for the day was an amazing $8600, and Barry tells me that the innovative Himatangi Beach bowlers may have started a trend by turning up in fancy dress. If this catches on in the future, maybe the Hospice event might include some of the more desirable features of the Wellington Sevens.

At the Palmerston North greens, Lindsay Toms skipped his Rose and Crown combo to another victory in a very successful North Island Licensed Victuallers’ event. The final, against one of many Taranaki entries, went to an extra end, on which the leading of Ted ‘Tip Top’ Hodgson broke the hearts of his opponents, as had happened throughout the game and the tournament. A social highlight was provided by a Question and Answer session with TV Rugby commentator Grant Nisbett, who is a regular at this LVA event. ‘Nisbo’ was aided and abetted by the inimitable John Graham, also a member of the winning team.

Denis Duffy

Thanks Denis.

Update 26^th February 2014.

Comment on Bowls   by Denis Duffy.

As Bowls followers battled the horrendous gales to locate a worthwhile spectacle last weekend, probably very few thought to stop off at the abandoned top green at Takaro. If they had, they would have observed our Commonwealth Games players, Barry Wynks and Mark Noble, hard at work for hours on end as they gradually master the skills they will require. A very different mindset, backed up by distinctly different skills, is required to be competitive on the rough, lead-heavy and at times under-prepared greens that most countries in the world strangely choose to play on. It was encouraging to hear that Mark and Barry were joined at the weekend by Wellington’s Lisa White, a member of our Women’s Team, who was in the squad that journeyed to Glasgow to experience the foreign conditions in recent months. Sharon Sims is also giving generously of her time and ‘knowhow’. To be able to tap into the experience of a local player who has managed to earn medals in top Northern Hemisphere competition must be a big advantage. Centre President Phil Skoglund battled greens like these at Edmonton in 1978, leading to his biographer later being threatened with a libel suit for honestly reporting his opinion of the local surfaces! It’s comical now to read in ‘Mr Bowls’, the biography of Phil’s uncle T.T. Skoglund, how this country sent a team in total ignorance and completely unprepared to the Vancouver Empire Games of 1954. New Zealanders played on lightning-fast grass greens in those days, and our team were totally bewildered to find themselves competing on vast swards composed of something vaguely resembling buffalo grass.

The major fixtures of the weekend were of course the Hexagonal for Men and Women, which was endorsed by players and officials and will be continued into the future. The performance of both our teams was simply outstanding. The Women proved themselves equal to the powerful Wellington side and the Men just got home ahead of Wanganui, while both left the other four Centres battling for the minor places. The Men’s Singles players, Shane Rogers and Darryl Johnson, must deserve special mention for their lion-hearted exhibitions of skill and tenacity in seriously adverse conditions, finishing with a scarcely believable nine wins and a narrow loss from ten starts. Darryl’s immaculate weight control and Shane’s ability to fight back from substantial deficits were a highlight, but the combined achievement of both teams was huge. Then came the difficult process for the respective selectors of cutting back their successful teams to the seven players required. Viv Lozell’s Women’s team looks strong and experienced, with an in-form Feona Sayles providing the spearhead in the Singles. The Men’s side is a conservative selection by Terry Puklowski, who has preferred  to call on the vast top-level experience of Philip Skoglund in the Singles, rather than gambling on Shane Rogers being able to step up to an even higher plane. Shane will be disappointed, but he’s in the team, and both Men and Women have the firepower to pull off a big result.

This weekend sees another chapter of the very successful Hospice Tournament at Northern with its associated auctions and raffles which Barry Gush continues to organise and run so well. If readers not already involved are keen to participate in any way in this worthy event, they should contact Barry or the Northern Club, even at this late stage.

Denis Duffy

Thanks Denis.