The Central Coast Singles Championship was played across three separate disciplines, the open Major Singles, the Senior Singles for players over 60 years of age and the President Reserve Singles for Grade 5 Pennant players and below.’
The prestige Major Singles known as the “Blue Ribbon” title attracted a field of 79 players and was narrowed down to eight quarter finalists, all of whom had never reached the final of this event. The sectional rounds were keenly contested with many of the name players falling by the wayside.
Terrigal’s Darren Morrison powered his way into the final with a strong semi-final win over Gwandalen’s Chris Willingham 31-13 and Avoca Beach’s Tony Shoebridge’s experience and consistency overshadowed his younger Gwandalan opponent Billy Maskell 31-20.
The final was a new stage for both players and Darren Morrison was in great touch to establish an early match winning lead over Tony Shoebridge 18-3, but to Tony’s credit he fought back in a very high standard game of draw bowling to give the fi nal score some degree of respectability at 31-19.
For 27 year old Darren, a No1 Pennant skip at Terrigal and a Central Coast Representative skip, it was a well deserved victory and another step up the ladder in elite company. The Senior Singles was contested by a field of 52 experienced and crafty bowlers keen to show they haven’t lost their competitive edge.
The four semi-finalists had all previously enjoyed success in this championship event, they being Terrigal’s Garry Murphy runner-up in 2013, Lindsay Willding from Halekulani and Alan Rogers from Avoca Beach winning the title in 2009 and 2011 respectively and the best overall performer being Terrigal’s Tony Swaine, who won the title in 2007 and was runner-up in 2006, 11 and 12.
The semi-finals produced some top draw bowling with Alan Rogers gaining the upper hand over Garry Murphy 31-23 and Lindsay Willding playing out a close encounter over Tony Swaine 31-28 to gain a finals berth.
As was to be expected, the final between Lindsay Willding and Alan Rogers was a close encounter with Lindsay establishing a handy buffer of 5 to 6 shots for three quarters of the game before the margin was progressively narrowed and the scores became locked at 30 all.
It was almost down to the toss of a coin, until evergreen Willding drew the “absoluter” for Game, Set and Match. The seventy five (75) strong field in the Presidents Reserve Singles saw a bunch of emerging new faces reach the finals, with Breakers/ Wamberal Paul Charge maintaining his winning form in the semi-finals to defeat the 2012 President Single’s winner Steve Balsdon 31-20 and Diggers’ Robert Dwyer playing himself into the final with a strong 31-10 win over Ken Young.
The final was a new and tense experience for both players, with Robert Dwyer establishing and maintaining an early 5-6 shot lead throughout the first half of the game with Paul Charge clawing his way back to take the lead 17-16 after 20 ends and held on to a 2-3 shot margin until Robert leveled at 28 all. It was “Game On,” but Paul steadied with some telling draw shots to claim the title 31-28.
Media release,
20 July 2015
Kevin Dring, Bowls Central
Coast