The majority of the prizemoney from this year’s South West Classic Pairs bowls tournament hosted by the Cootamundra Country Club stayed in town, but finished ‘up the road’ as two Ex-Services Club teams claimed a rare quinella.
It was the first-time pairing of Dennis O’Brien and Peter Colvin who had their names added to the long and illustrious list of previous winners after they
finished marginally ahead of Ex-Services club-mates Ian Vesperman and Chris Luck.
Highlighting the quality of bowls played across the weekend tournament, which saw five games of 13 ends contested, no less than five teams finished with the perfect record of five victories meaning the accumulative margins of shots would decide the major placings.
Boosted by a dominant performance in their fourth game where they won by a massive 24 shots, O’Brien and Colvin finished with five wins +58 shots to enjoy a clear 12 shot margin over Vesperman and Luck.
The eventual champions took full advantage of the familiar environment of their home green, which was again used in conjunction with the Country Club’s three, winning both their Saturday afternoon matches at the Ex-Services Club.
They opened with a +9 victory over the composite side of Ron Geilser (Batemans Bay) and Keith Harpley (Wagga RSL), before a narrow +3 win over Yass pair Daniel and Rodney Wilson.
One of just 15 of the 56 competing teams to have two wins in the bank at the end of Saturday’s play, O’Brien and Colvin began their Sunday assault with an impressive +12 victory over Gary Corkery and Ray Axam from Albion Park.
The telling match came prior to lunch when they completely dominated the team of Mike Hennessy and Winton Moore from Sussex Inlet, the 24 shot margin seeing them leading the six remaining
undefeated teams.
By that stage O’Brien and Colvin had a total
margin of +48 to be three ahead of Brian Madden and Terry Ricketts from Harden, while Vesperman and Luck were poised to strike being just one shot further back.
With tension mounting over the final two hours play, O’Brien and Colvin held their nerve to keep their record in tact and add another 10 shots to their margin when they defeated B?? Cook and M Byrne from Bronte.
With Madden and Ricketts suffering their first defeat of the weekend and Vesperman and Luck only to increase their overall margin by two, the title and the accompany $1000 prizemoney belonged to the Ex-Services Club duo.
Vesperman and Luck dominated three of their fives matches, returning margins of +15, +14 and +12, however it was their +3 in game two and +2 in game five that saw them slip behind.
Former Cootamundra resident Don Cooper enjoyed a successful return to town, teaming with his Batemans Bay club-mate Dave Caldwell to finish third on five wins +42, while locals John Bartel and Jeff Cook were also among the major money.
Cook teamed with Shllharbour’s Mal Pearson to finish fourth on five wins +27, while Bartel and his partner Ricky Potter from Temora rounded out the five game winners, finishing with a margin of +16.
Email a friend
Favourites
Del.icio.us
Facebook
Digg
StumbleUpon
MySpace
Reddit
Newsvine
LinkedIn
Kwoff
Twitter