Eastern Ranges championship finals
Close to 100 people witnessed an extraordinary exhibition of bowls as four Grand Finals were played out at Mount Waverley Bowls Club.
Firstly there was the Men’s and Ladies Eastern Ranges Under 25s Singles Bowls Championships, which saw two truly great games.
The Ladies Championship was won 25-17 by Kirsten Day, aged 22 from Yarra Glen, over Amity Bickley, 11 years old, from Mulgrave Country Club. The margin was seemingly comfortable for Kirsten, which saw her 13 years’ bowls experience carry the day.
The Men’s Championship was won 25-15 by Shaun Wilson, 22 from Ashburton, over Cooper Kraus, also 22, from Mulgrave.
The score belied the closeness of the game with both players showing great bowls maturity and acumen to the very last bowl.
The other Eastern Ranges Grand Finals were the Men’s and Ladies Novice Singles which is won by the player who scores 21 first.
This Championship was only open to Bowlers first affiliated on or after 1st July 2016.
Each player had less than 18 months’ experience. The Men’s Novice was won 21-9 by Max Goldsmith aged 20 years from Mulgrave over Julian Morilly from Heathmont.
Max played an outstanding game to which Julian, despite every effort, could just not find an answer.
The best Grand Final was kept to last in the Ladies Novice Championship, between Lorraine Mussett from Churchill Waverley Golf against Keryn Wright from Monbulk.
The game was tight every step of the way and finally levelled at 20 shots each, which meant the last end in bowls terms became a shootout with either player needing only one shot to win.
Keryn bowled well and was holding three shots with Lorraine seemingly facing certain defeat, when she produced the bowl of the night to take shot and win the championship 21-20. A truly outstanding game from both players, who turned a Novice championship into a Champion Championship.
The winners now proceed to play other Regional Championship winners on the way to 2018 State Champions Week in Bendigo.
