AROUND THE GREENS

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31628, 14 March 1968, Page 6

AROUND THE GREENS

Major bowls fixtures for the week ending March 20 are:—

Today: electric light tournament at Beckenham; all day tournaments at Cashmere and Riccarton WM.C. (halfday). Saturday: champion of champion fours; Malvern sub-centre game (away); all day tournaments at Christchurch W.M.C. and Ashburton club and M.S.A. (Peters Cup). Sunday: Sunday tournaments at Burnham Camp, Kaiapoi, Waikari and Woolston WJW.C. Monday: electric light tournaments at Beckenham and Linwood. Tuesday: electric light tournaments at Cashmere and Redcliffs. Wednesday: electric light tournaments at Rangiora and Spreydon; all day tournament at Lincoln. A Champion Team The career of many fine bowlers, not the least of whom are the St Albans pair, W. J. Cogswell and A. Hughes, began on the West Coast. They are the Christchurch Bowling Centre’s open pairs champions for 1968, a title they won by beating P. Meier and T. W. Dixon (South

Brighton) in the final at St Martins last week.

Cogswell was stationed with the police in Greymouth before the Second World War and decided he needed some form of relaxation.

Before returning to Christchurch he won five centre titles on the Coast, and last week's win gave him his third Christchurch centre title. The others were the champion of champion pairs in 1963 and the Easter fours last year with Hughes. Between 1944 and 1949, Cogswell won the champion of champion pairs of the Malvern sub-centre three times. He won the club singles and fours at Linwood before joining St Albans in 1960, where he has won the club singles twice, the pairs five times and the fours on three occasions. Cogswell has been a mem-

ber of the second-placed team in both the open pairs and Easter tournament. He is also active as an administrator and is the centre delegate for the Darfield club, which elected him a life member in 1950 He is a past president of the Christchurch centre.

It was perhaps natural that he should team with Hughes —they married sisters. Hughes has been playing for 29 years—and started after he ended administrative duties with the United Football Club. L. Mercer, who won more than 47 club and centre titles on the West Coast was instrumental in sparking off Hughes’s interest in bowls by “kidding him” into playing. Hughes also played cricket. Hughes has won five West Coast centre titles, and one year was successful in a Nelson Easter tournament

In the three years he has been in Christchurch, he and Cogswell have won two club pairs titles. The other two players in the successful 1967 Easter fours tournament were W. R. Wilkinson and H. Hartley, who comprise another well-known pairs combination.

Hughes was on- the Dominion Bowling Council for

four years and was secretary of the West Coast centre for 16 years. Linwood The laying of the Redpatb green with cotulla will complete the club’s programme of converting all three of its greens to weed. The surface of the Redpath green has recently been removed, new soil has been spread and the area has been rotary hoed. The weed will be planted when this work has consolidated.

In the club championships, M. T. Preston, J. J. Anderson, J. Smith and J. P. Anderson (skip) beat A. G. Peters, V. C. Empson, A. T. Black and K. Wilkie in the final of the fours. E. Lyons beat A. T. Black, 18-16, in the singles, in

which the lead changed hands 12 times. Black has had an unfortunate season. He was runner-up in the singles, fours and pairs. St Albans Games The president’s fours winners were N. Wadsworth, S. Perry, H. van Dalsum and A. Robinson (skip). They were unbeaten on the day. W. Stock has a promising career ahead. In this, his third year, he beat A. Hearne in the intermediate final. In his first season, he won the colts championship, and last year was runner-up in the championship pairs with W. Bell as the skip. Beckenham The annual match between Beckenham and the Police played recently for the Dowling Cup developed into a closely-fought' contest, which Beckenham eventually won by a few points. The Rowe Pennant match between the Beckenham and St Martins clubs was also a very successful tournament, St Martins winning by 22 points. In the Beckenham championship singles final, N. A. Brostow beat T. Brien by three points. Brostow drew consistently throughout the match and Brien found the green a little on the heavy side. A. Lainsbury beat D. Brown in the colts’ championship to take the title for the second, successive year. C. Skerton and H. Dutton (skip) beat G, Cotton and J. Lyell (skip) after a closely contested game in the club pairs final. The rinks title was won by K. Little, who beat M. Yiigovich by a few points. The winning team was T. R. Steans, H. Kibblewhite, H. Peilow and Little. Sydenham Only once in the 69 years of its existence has a bowler won all championships at Sydenham—until this yean F. Matthews has made a clean sweep to equal the feat of R. Kennerly in 1947. Matthews (skip) won the fours with H. Thelin, E. Nord and A. Britten. Britten was

skip to Matthews in the successful pairs combination, and Matthews also won the singles. Britten and Matthews were

in the winning fours in 1962, they won the pairs in 1961 while Nord was a member of the champion four ih 1965. Thelin is a second year colt. Britten won the club singles in 1951 and 1960 and the pairs also in 1949 and 1957. Munn Trophy One hundred and two teams entered the Munn Trophy competition for mid-week friendly bowlers which was played over two days last week.

Seven greens were used and teams with four wins went to Edgeware for the second day. Nine teams qualified and in the final, Halswell (J. Searle, R. McCaw, H. Blakely and L. Malcolm, skip) beat Bumside (P. Storey, R. Coup, M. Brown and I. Skipworth, skip). W.M.C. Tournament Although there was disappointment especially among the many visiting bowlers, that there could be no play in the South Island W.M.C. tournament over the weekend, there was some compensation in the form of an excellent function on the Saturday night. On Sunday morning, the visiting bowlers were

able to have a friendly roll up at the Christchurch W.M.C., and in the afternoon at Woolston W.M.C.

Shirley In the final of the singles, J. 0. Thompson beat A. Duthie. In the second and third year contest, the remaining players are W. Peckham, J. Cameron and V. Strong.

Goodwill Tour The recent goodwill tour of North Auckland by a party of bowlers from Christchurch was a great success. The tour organiser (Mr F. W. Larcombe) said on Monday evening at the Christchurch Bowling Centre’s delegates’ meeting that he had been on five tours of a similar nature but this was the best.