BOWLS

Southland Times, Issue 22215, 6 January 1934, Page 13

BOWLS

(By

“Kitty.”)

FIXTURES AHEAD.

Monday, January B—New Zealand Championship Tournament at Dunedin. Wednesday, January 31—City v. Western District at Winton at 5.45 p.m. (Ten Rinks, five on each green). Wednesday, February 7—City v. Eastern District on Wyndham Green at 5.45 p.m. (Eight Rinks). Wednesday, February 14—Shield Rink Championship at 8 a.m., and Consolation Rinks for losers in first round. Entries close on Saturday, February 10, at 8 p.m. Wednesday, February 21 —Harraway Shield Match, Otago v. Southland, Invercargill. Tuesday, February 27—Mayor’s Pairs at 5.15 p.m. sharp. All games to be played on neutral greens. Byes to be arranged in first round. Wednesday, February 28 and Thursday March I—Continuation of Mayor’s Pairs at 5.15 p.m. Wednesday, March 7—Champion of Champion Pairs at 8 a.m. Play on sudden death principle with Consolation Pairs for losers in first round. Entries close on March 3 at 8 p.m. Wednesday, March 14—Champion of Champion Singles at 8 a.m. Play on automatic two-life system. Entries close on March 10 at 8 p.m. Thursday, March 29 to April 3 —North. Otago Easter Tournament.

Tourney Sidelights and Highlights. Statistics showing the number of bowls sent away on the wrong bias would be interesting. Nor were the offenders always the young hands—did not J. H. Macdonald make a fatal slip, too? The annual tournaments here have for many years always seen the centre come out on the right side of the ledger. Owing to the proximity of the New Zealand championship fixture at Dunedin next week, this year’s entries for Southland were somewhat affected. In fact, the centre put in its receipts pocket about £lO less than was the case last year. When the expenditure is subtracted from the incomings, however, there will be a profit of some £2o—usually it is in the vicinity of £3O. . r , D. H. Thomson, past president of the centre, evidently believes in keping a promise. At the last tournament here, when on the eve of departing for Oamaru, he declared he would bring down a North Otago rink to the fixture just over—and he did. The visitors, too, gave a good account of themselves, for with three wins out of four they tied with Halliday (Hokonui) for division honours. The Gore rink, however, in the play-off gained a victory. Thomson and Co. acquitted themselves well in the first round game when they met formidable opponents in Mayhew, Batcheler, Smithies and A. S. Froggatt, the Te Rangi four being defeated by 22—12.

The absence of anything in the nature of friction at the tournament was favourably commented upon by D. C. Cameron (St. Kilda). For many years he has been a regular visitor to the southern fixture and he declared this one was probably the most pleasant he had attended—everything ran so smoothly. The umpires at the various greens— A. Courtis and T. Meredith (Northend), B. E. Leggat and J. Forbes (Southland), W. T. Gilbert (Invercargill), T. Stevenson and R. Drummond (Te Rangi), W. Russell (Waihopai) and Alex Peterson (Waikiwi) —all carried out their duties efficiently. That on no occasion was a decision of any one of them questioned is most gratifying. In the hand of a brilliant writer, what a highly amusing description could the pen give of the various attitudes adopted by many of the bowlers on the greens during the tournament! There is, of course, the orthodox stance and, on the other hand, the unorthodox, the latter classification being especially wide in its ambit. Dowland, the singles champion, once the bovyl left his hand would invariably adopt a Tower-of-Pisa bodily lean as he walked along intent on watching its run. His third, D. C. Cameron, hunched one shoulder probably a foot above the other after his delivery. . . . And so on, ad infinitum.

Two outstanding “youngsters” past the allotted span were Spiers and Summerill, lead and second respectively in Dowland’s champion rink. Spiers drew particularly well, but Fortune drew better. Certainly each lead gave very valuable support. Summerill, too, sent down some well-judged bowls.

Fortune, too, could not go wrong and he invariably finished near the jack. Even at short ends he was as equally at home as at the longer heads. “Whew!” was the cry of astonishment from the lips of 100 odd enthusiasts when F. G. Stevenson “caught” S. Smith for a seven in the pairs semifinal. Up to that stage the Northender had had a fairly comfortable lead, but the scores then became level and he had to fight hard for- the victory. The seven happened like this: Stevenson was lying two. Smith split the two shot bowls and trailed the kitty back a foot to himself lie the shot. The jack was completely hidden by several bowls in front. Stevenson, with a fast one, wicked off some side bowls to take Smith’s shot bowl out—a lucky score. Smith played a short one. Stevenson then took another of Smith’s bowls out to lie seven!

A greenkeeper, an undertaker, an ex-schoolmaster and a warehouseman were the respective occupations of the rink skipped by J. Harraway, of Dunedin. The Skip was the warehouseman, W. Benzie the greenkeeper, J. Fraser the undertaker and T. D. Pearce the ex-dominie.

The final of the rinks competition ended in the glare of a brilliant headlight—Dowland’s beautiful draw dead on the jack. Everything depended on the skill of the St Kilda skip as he took up his last bowl and, from the very moment that it left his hand, it looked a “winner” all the way.

“It was almost a pleasure to lose the game to such a bowl.” Thus did D. K. Torrance, the opposing skip, pay a graceful and sporting tribute to Dowland’s prowess. Each rink in the final scored over 10 heads apiece; each netted one four.

On all sides it seems agreed that Dowland cannot possibly give a more outstanding performance in any future match than he did in this final. He was called upon much more often than was Torranse to show his ability, for the Southland rink’s position was frequently stronger when the skips changed over. Had the Northerner been at all off with his running shots there would have been a different story to tell. He was, however, absolutely deadly and changed head after- head.

Coming events cast their shadows before, it has been said. At the sixth head in this game, Torrance remarked to Dowland that he would like to see the scores level at the last end. “So would I,” said Dowland, “but I hope I do not have to play the last bowl.”

Torrance had a fine trio in Fortune, Taylor and Snow, for they repeatedly put the skip in a strong position with their skilful drawing and smart cutting in. Dowland was always there, however, to upset things. Taylor, who filled the breach when W. Stewart was unfortunately not able to skip the Southland rink, won welldeserved recognition for his fine performance as second for Torrance. In the final, especially, he played a game “out of the box,” drawing to the jack in well-night brilliant fashion. Imperturable throughout, he was the essence

of steadiness and, though he experienced a slight difficulty in playing on the backhand, he gave, on the whole, an outstanding display. Snow’s valuable match temperament stood him in good stead and he certainly outclassed Cameron, Dowling’s third. Cameron however, seemed off colour, for his play did not give a true indication of his undoubted ability. Snow drew beautifully on several occasions, but in several cases so closely did Fortune and Taylor hug the kitty that he could play only to strengthen the back bosition.

It is interesting to mention that the rinks’ final at the tournament four years ago was fought out between St. Kilda (Dowland, Cameron and Langley) and Southland (Torrance, Ayling, Snow and Stewart) and that on that occasion the northerners also snatched a victory on the last head. Southland were one up but their opponents netted two to gain a win by one point.

Though the honour of winning a final is the main consideration and the amount of the prize money but a side issue, it is worthy of mention that away back in 1921 the Southland Centre in an endeavour to further popularize the tournament, offered £4O as a first prize in the rinks’ competition. But the N.Z. Bowling Association took the matter up, and, arguing that the sum was too large a plum for the sport, forced the Southland Centre to reduce the amount to £2l—£s 5/- each.

On that occasion, too, Dowland had a finger in the prize pie. It was his first year at the game and his first tournament. He was lead for J. McCurdy, who also had in his rink P. Edwards and none other than P. J. Israel. The latter, though domociled at Invercargill, came forward to fill the vacancy when the Dunedinites could not muster a full four. They met in the final a Mataura rink skipped by Thorn but went right through the competition without a loss.

The “driver” has never been particularly popular with the general body of bowlers, who are prone to regard him as somewhat “outside the pale.” While it is true that drawing is the foundation of the game, the drive, however, has its place, and rightly too. What is more, unless a bowler can both draw and drive successfully, he will not go very far in the sport. Where a drive is essential, it is thoroughly justified; it is only where there appears to be ample room to draw, that the driver, in such a case, exposes himself to strong criticism. Nothing was more delightful to watch in the rinks’ final than the manner in which Snow and Cameron cleanly took opponents’ bowls out time and again.

Smith was in brilliant form when driving in the pairs’ final against Scandrett and Lillicrap—he was always accurate. It was rather surprizing however, to observe that more generous recognition of Smith’s work was not forthcoming from the large number of enthusiasts lining the bank, as the “Well Playcd’s!” were very few and far between. Even allowing for the fact that the majority of the onlookers obviously frowned upon driving tactics surely it would have been but sporting for them to have applauded, more spontaneously, Smith’s fine work. Such applause would in no wise have stamped them as supporters of the drive; it would have just shown an appreciation of the spectacular performance of a skip who, whether rightly or wrongly, favoured driving tactics and, that being so, showed his prowess in that direction.

Congratulations are due to D. K. Torrance, who, skipping his first rink at the tournament bore with credit the burdens of his position. In the division matches on Monday he was in fine form and never once did he fail to achieve his purpose. He found Shaw’s rink particularly hard in the - semifinals but put his team in a healthier position when, at the 14th with the score 13 to 12 in his favour and when Te Rangi were then lying three, he burnt the head with his last—a great drive. Southland netted three at the next making themselves 16 to 12, and Shaw, who play a particularly good game, found the task of scoring four or five too great for him especially as his opponents had all the position at the final end when the skips crosed over.

Torrance started somewhat on the nervous side in the final but settled down well after the first early stages. He had luck dead against him on the last end. Snow was lying the shot, about a foot from the jack. The shot bowl was in a slightly exposed position and Torrance attempted to protect it in order to frustrate any attempt by Dowland to have a run at it. Torrance drew another but unfortunately, opener a port. Dowland’s first was narrow. Torrance endeavoured to put in a block —always a difficult bowl to play—and partially achieved that object. Dowland, however, drew brilliantly dead to the jack— and the match was won. Did Torrance commit a strategicol error under the circumstances in attempting to draw another when Snow, his third, had the shot? The question is quite a debateable one. One up on the last end with Dowland two bowls in hand was not the safest of positions for Torrance by any means. St. Kilda, to make matters worse, had the back bowl. If Torrance had not attempted to cover Snow and, by doing so, drawn another (as it so happened), Dowland would doubtless have had a couple of drives and Torrance’s one point may well have been obliterated. With two up, each a foot from the kitty, Torrance had the upper hand and the game almost in his grasp, but if Dowland was to draw dead on the jack then it called for a magnificent shot and if he could succeed (doubtlessly Torrance and his men argued beforehand) the St Kilda skip would well deserve the victory. Strange how the man on the bank can always play the game so much better than the man on the field!!

Though past the allotted span, A. McPherson, the Waikiwi veteran, skipping R. Dick in the pairs, went right through his division to gain four wins. In the play-off for the green final, however, he went under to McGorlick. McPherson played some good games in his own inimitable style and rattled on fours and fives on many occasions—ask Taggart, of Northend.