On the mats — Indoor bowls news

Centre open pairs champions Doc Tipene (left) and Jay Casey. Pictures by David Lynn

Andrew Rickard outclassed the field, winning the Friday Night Singles for his 14th centre title.

Rickard defeated Kayla Trowell in his first game, then beat Hina Preddey. A loss to David Lynn in Game 3 meant Rickard needed to win or draw his last game in the qualifying round to qualify. He beat Doc Tipene to move into the sudden-death playoff.

Rickard drew the bye, so went straight into the semifinal and played Lynn again over three ends. Lynn picked up the maximum four shots in End 1, Rickard did the same in End 2. In the last end, Rickard played a great draw bowl on to the kitty and Lynn couldn't get near, giving Rickard the win.

Rickard played Malcolm Trowell in the final. After the first two ends, Rickard was 2-0 up. On the third and final end, Rickard held shot, but Trowell pushed the shot bowl out with his last bowl to force a measure for two shots.

The measure revealed Trowell had only one shot, meaning Rickard won the match 2-1.

Jay Casey and Doc Tipene won the centre open pairs, defeating Nathan Trowell and Bruce Easton 9-6. Casey played some outstanding shots in the win.

After two ends of the nine-end final, the Casey pair were 4-0 up. In End 3, Casey was two to three shots down on the head, but calmly got down and dead drew the kitty to win the point and go 5-0 up.

On End 5 and holding two shots on the head, Trowell and Easton had an opportunity to get back into the game if they split some of Casey's bowls right out of the head for a possible five points. Instead, they tried to draw for three shots and came up just short, and the score was 6-2.

On End 6, Trowell and Easton held three or four shots, when Casey played a superbly weighted shot on to a front bowl, pushing the kitty sideways to end up with one shot. Trowell tried to take that shot off, but killed the end, giving Casey three penalty points for knocking the kitty off the mat. From then on, at 9-2 up, Casey and Tipene just had to limit any losses on ends. Trowell picked up two points on End 7, one point on End 8 and one on the last.

This was Casey's first centre title. He won the under-18 singles in 1993 but that wasn't a centre title. He moved away from the game to concentrate on family and rugby league, but in the past few years has come back into it and is playing top-notch bowls.

For Tipene, this was centre title No.7.