CHAMPIONS: The North Island indoor bowls team celebrate beating the South Island in the annual inter-island test match for a 14th consecutive year. PHOTO/SUPPLIED
CHAMPIONS: The North Island indoor bowls team celebrate beating the South Island in the annual inter-island test match for a 14th consecutive year. PHOTO/SUPPLIED
The North Island Indoor Bowls team has dominated its South Island counterpart for more than a decade.
On Saturday, at the Rotorua Girls' High School Arena, they won the annual Inter-Island Indoor Bowls test match for the 14th consecutive year, 32-16, to retain the Kevin Eddy Memorial Trophy.
The firstsession of three was even with both teams winning four matches each. The singles, pairs and triples were played over 21 ends and the fours over 18 ends.
The North won the women's singles and fours and the men's pairs and fours while the South won the women's pairs and triples and the men's singles and triples.
The second session was disastrous for the South with only the men's singles player, Mike King, claiming a win, defeating against the North's Avon Compton. The win gave him the inter-island medal for the discipline.
Having won in the first session, wins in the second round for the North Island's women's singles, women's fours, men's pairs and men's fours saw them claim the inter-island medals in their respective disciplines.
In the final session the North won both the men's and women's singles. Avon Compton defeated Mike King 16-12 while Maureen Pruden maintained her unbeaten record 23-14.
In the women's pairs the North's Gina Owen, of Rotorua, and Rochelle Hastie won the third game to claim the inter-island medals against Ann Graham and Jenny Eden.
The North's Alanna Preddy skipped her team of Marilyn Holmes and Carolyn Cooper to win the inter-island medals in the women's triples 25-15 against the South's Jess Moffat, Lisa Gould and Sue Bourne.
The South recovered to win the final game in the men's fours 24-19 and to draw the women's fours 18-18.
The North's Paul Wright and Richard Caddy, the current national pairs title holders, proved too strong for James Sullivan and Brandon Williams wrapping up a win in the men's pairs 24-10.
The men's triples was a cliffhanger with the scores even going into the last end. It came down to an umpire's measure to decide the outcome when both teams had a bowl touching the jack.
The end was drawn and the score was 16-16. However, on the countback of ends with both teams having a win and a draw, the South's Michael Lawson, Brian Hotton and Daniel Sinclair won the inter-island medals.
