Indoor bowls news

UNDER-18 WINNERS: The Poverty Bay-East Coast under-18 indoor bowls team with the Membrey Pearce Trophy. They are, back (from left): Malcolm Trowell (selector), Akuhata Keelan, Sian Williams, Hina Preddey, Rachael Rickard and Dylan Anderson. Front: Matthew Foster, Nathan Trowell, Dylan Foster and Adam Rickard. Pictures by Rebecca Grunwell

The Poverty Bay-East Coast under-18 indoor bowls team won the Membrey Pearce Trophy in Hamilton. It was the third year in a row they had won it.

After weeks of practice and fine-tuning with selector Malcolm Trowell, they came out firing and never let up, finishing the day with 51 points.

Bay Of Plenty were runners-up, on 48 points; followed by North Taranaki, 39pts; Tauranga. 37.5pts, Auckland 31.5pts, Counties/Thames Valley combined, 27pts; and Waikato, 18pts.

For Poverty Bay-East Coast, Matthew Foster and Sian Williams recorded five wins, Akuhata Keelan and Dylan Foster recorded four wins and a draw, Nathan Trowell and Adam Rickard had four wins, and Dylan Anderson and Hina Preddey had three wins and a draw from the six games played.

One of the games that started the team’s dominance was when Nathan Trowell and Adam Rickard defeated New Zealand u18 singles champion Matthew Farquhar and Ciera Paterson from Bay of Plenty 6-5 on the very last bowl of the game in Round 2 to win three valuable game points.

All of the team played great bowls.

Poverty Bay-East Coast, with 52 points, beat Central Hawkes Bay (23pts) and Napier (33pts) in the Hunt Trophy competition held in Gisborne.

The Bay got off to the best of starts, winning both their fours games for all eight points. In the first singles games, the team recorded five wins and a draw from their eight games to record 11pts, taking their overall score to 19pts. Nine points in the first pairs round, followed by another 8pts (two wins) in the fours round took their total points to 36.

On Day 2 they continued their dominance, recording six wins and a draw from eight games in the singles round to clinch overall victory. In the last round of pairs, they won one game of the four.

Matthew Foster was in outstanding form, top-scoring and winning all six of his games. Malcolm Trowell had five wins and a draw; Andrew Rickard had five wins; Nathan Trowell, Dylan Foster, Nanette Treloar and Sian Williams all had four wins; and Bryan Pulley had three wins and a draw.