Men and women bowlers miss the cut

Both the Whanganui men and women rep bowling teams fell short at the National Intercentre Tournament in Wellington.

Both the Whanganui men and women's representative teams were knocked out of contention for post section play at the National Intercentre Bowls Championships in Wellington last weekend.

Men's selector/coach Lindsay Wheeler said while his side played well they were not good enough against such strong opposition in their section with Canterbury, Dunedin, Bay of Plenty, Hawkes Bay and West Coast.

"This was the horror draw and certainly the most difficult section to play in," Wheeler said.
"While we won for games and very close in another five, even if games had gone our way we would have struggled to qualify. Two of the sides that qualified from our section made the semi-finals but unfortunately they drew each other.

"Canterbury won this semi-final and played North Harbour in the final and won all three disciplines."

Whanganui singles player Bernard Anderson had one win, pairs Ian Porteous and Gavin Scrivener one win and the fours Ray Park, Phil Corney, Lindsay Bourne, Tony McCrae won two.

"The highlight was our fours team who had the two wins against Canterbury and Dunedin who were the top sides in our section," Wheeler said.

Meanwhile, women's selector/coach Chris Waterson said his side failed to capitalise on claiming their close encounters.

"We really only just missed out from qualifying and if we had won those close games we may well have," Waterson said.

"Dianne Patterson had an excellent tournament in the singles drawing one and winning two against strong sides. Dianne drew 11-all and then lost two close ones 14-13 and 25-24. The latter was against Dunedin in the third round and she only lost after leading 24-23 with one end to play.

"Her win against Nelson and New Zealand squad member Kirstie Edwards was a very good result. Our pairs Anne Loveridge and Marlene Foster had a convincing win over Counties-Manukau 28-9, while our fours (Reen Stratford, Marilyn Constatine, Pauline Pirere, Maria Klitscher) drew against Counties-Manukau and beat Dunedin.

"Over all a very good performance at a tournament where even the top sides Canterbury and Wellington failed to qualify," Waterson said.

Bay Of Plenty won the tournament after beating Counties-Manukau in the final.