PAKENHAM BOWLS CLUB
• MEN’S SINGLES CHAMPIONSHIP
A good crowd turned out last week to watch and support Neil ‘Big Dev’ Devlin and Keith Lewis as they fought out the club singles title for season 2022/23 and they were not disappointed – with both players putting on a display of quality bowls.
With Neil not quite getting the weight right, Keith jumped away to an early lead and seemed to be “on song.”
However, you can’t keep a champion down for long – on the tenth end, Devs picked up a three and followed it up with another triple on the eleventh – suddenly it was game on!
The two players then traded blows for a time with Neil generally a couple of shots or so in front until the nineteenth end when the big guy scored a four, taking his lead to six shots.
However, Keith struck back immediately, narrowing the gap by adding three to his own tally.
Not to be outdone, Neil then grabbed another three and with the score at 22 to 16 was in sight of the finish line, again with six shots in hand.
Keith dug deep and scored another four shots over the next couple of ends to reduce the margin to two, but that was as close as he got, as Big Dev scored another three on the twenty-fourth end to take the title by 25 shots to 20.
Well done to both players – they provided a game worthy of a championship and certainly entertained the spectators.
• PENNANT – DIVISIONAL FINALS
With five out of seven teams finishing on top of their respective Pennant ladders – and each of those five winning Sectional Pennants – Pakenham Bowls Club has had an exceptional season.
Even the so called ‘Development Side’, the Saturday Fourths, began to string together some wins towards the back end of the season and became quite competitive with some members graduating to the thirds and playing their part in that team’s success.
Each of the five winning teams will be promoted next season and hopefully will be equally successful in the higher divisions – in particular, the number one midweek side will move back into Division One where they should acquit themselves well.
For the Midweek Twos, the last side still “live” at Divisional level, the season finally came to an end in the Divisional Semi-Final at Glen Waverley last Tuesday where they were comprehensively beaten by Camberwell Central.
An analysis of the score cards would indicate that Pakenham was behind at each of the milestones in that game, yet from the perspective both of the players and those observing, it wasn’t until the very last ends that the Lions looked like they had no chance of winning.
However, Camberwell simply proved to be too strong in the end and eventually won by 81 shots to 56.
The rink of Lindsay Stevenson (S), Bill Bosch (3), Ash Graham (2) and Ken Clifton (L) fought back hard over the last five ends, eventually going down by a just one shot.
The other members of the team were Jim Williams (S), Brian Norton (3), Gary ‘Crow’ Crowley (2), Sandra ‘Wildwoman’ Wilde (L); and Paul Currie (S), Derek Spraggon (3), Ray Leggett (2) and Wayne Oosthuizen (L).
Luis Aguilar stepped in late in the game as substitute for Derek Spraggon who was taken ill and put down some nice bowls in the limited time available to him.
It is yet to be seen whether season 2023/24 will be of a 14- or 18-week duration – members have been asked to comment.
-Des Leigh-
