Four Gisborne-East Coast teams travelled to the Ohope Bowling Club to play their Bay of Plenty counterparts in the annual fixture between the two centres on Sunday.
Bay of Plenty won the overall points contest to retain the Waioeka Shield for senior bowlers and the Endeavour Shield for juniors. Gisborne-East Coast had their successes, though.
In the senior men’s event, Gisborne-East Coast downed their rivals by 16 game points to 10 in an encouraging performance for this stage of the season.
Selector Steve Goldsbury was particularly pleased with the performances of John Kawana (a former Counties Manukau representative) and Bruce (Bruno) Lourie, a long-time Thames Valley representative.
Gisborne Bowling Club’s Jamey Ferris lost his first game in the singles 24-17, but won his second 23-15.
GEC were dominant in the two fours games, winning 14-5 and 15-6, and followed that up with two wins in the triples in the last round.
The GEC senior women were outclassed by Bay of Plenty, losing 24-3. The only win was registered by singles player Dayvinia Mills, who beat Mary Campbell 20-18 after Mills was ahead 14-3 at one stage. Both are national titleholders.
Some games were close, with margins of one or two, but in the second round Bay of Plenty had big wins in the singles (24-10), the pairs (26-14) and the fours (20-9).
Unfortunately for the GEC junior men’s and women’s teams, they had to play on the back green, which — according to reports — was not up to representative standard.
They were also up against the BoP junior teams who had won the Bowls NZ national men’s under-8s last season and finished fourth in the women’s event.
But the green was the same for both teams and Gisborne Bowling Club’s Ron Robertson (former world champion age-group athlete), playing his first game of competitive singles, got through 19-18 in the first round.
Junior men’s selector and newly elected Gisborne-East Coast centre president Mark Bain was pleased with his team’s overall performance.
He said it showed that training sessions through the winter months had been worthwhile.
Secondary school students Ashli Ferris and Luke Sanders, and Tolaga Bay Bowling Club’s Ben Elkington showed promise under the guidance of Murray Duncan, with support from Marty Ryan and Te Karaka Bowling Club’s Willy Murray.
In the final count of the junior men’s results over the three rounds, BoP got through, 14-11.
GEC’s junior women’s team also put in a promising performance. They lost 16-10 but can be pleased with their performance.
Three team members were making their debuts at this level — Kahutia’s Diane Oates and secondary school students Angela Gibson-Sam and Paige Richter.
After losing all their games in the first round, the fours team dealt a 24-1 hiding to their BoP opponents and the pairs followed up with an 18-8 win.
GEC continued their improvement in the three games of triples in the last round, winning 15-11, drawing 19-all and losing 13-10.
Selector Bruce Ball was pleased with the performance of all team members.
On overall points, Bay of Plenty retained the Waioeka Shield for the senior bowlers, 34-19, and the Endeavour Shield for the juniors, 30-21.