Secretary’s Report (2011)

DERBYSHIRE COUNTY CROWN GREEN BOWLING  ASSOCIATION

SECRETARY'S REPORT

Chairman,Ladies,&Gentlemen

I am pleased to present to you my 27^th Annual Report, which covers the 2011 Centenary season.

The year sadly with the death of long time President of the County, Ernie Rathbone, which meant Barrie Mimes taking over as President of the County Association. Bill Maybry produced a superb one off Centenary handbook, which has been welcomed by players and officials in the County and those outside. Centenary years for County organizations are always difficult to arrange competitions due to the large geographical areas that a large number of Counties cover. We hoped that the respective teams and individuals would do well in the BCGBA Championships and Major Championships in this prestigious year, but as you will see we only had one winner that being Darren Smith in the James Birks Memorial Midland Masters. Unfortunately, the one off Centenary Pairs had to be cancelled due to lack of entries during the season. This year was a difficult year on the playing front, we were in a tough group with last year’s winner’s Warwicks & Worcs in the County Championship, the always difficult Potteries and Merseyside, who we have struggled against every time we have played them. This proved to be the case as we lost every game and also failed to qualify for the Supplementary competition. Green selection seems to be our biggest difficulty at the minute, or maybe picking the right players to play on the selected green’s is the issue which needs sorting out at selection. The Juniors were in a favorable group with Cheshire who are rebuilding, and a strong Cambria team that had matured since the last time we played them 2 seasons ago. We won our group to face the holders Yorkshire who are always strong, in the semi-final, and despite the best result I have seen from our away team for some years we couldn’t win at home, and we lost by 35,considering they put 100 plus past every other County on the way to retaining their title you can see how well we did, hopefully next year we can go one better at least. The Alliance team started well beating our old nemesis Staffordshire, but then failing to add to this solitary victory, but again players are moving to the Senior team successfully, which is the purpose of the Alliance. The Vets were drawn in a tough group in Todmorden, but due to late withdrawals the team was the 8 who travelled, we lost to Cheshire by a small number in the first game ,then went onto lose to South Yorkshire Parks in the second ,but win against holders Wales in the 3rd game, a competition that we could quite easily won if our all selected players had turned up. Sadly the possibility of green losses continues to be a major issue, this year we will see an old stalwart in Mid Derbyshire Heage fold as the club have been moved off the green, and been unable obtain to find an alternative venue to play at. This is despite the Bill in Parliament earlier in the year which will go some way to stop the closure of green's, which is not retrospective unfortunately is due to get its second reading in the House of Commons next March. Clowne MW still lies untouched as does the Civil Service Club at Chesterfield since their closures, as we have said before planning permission will not be granted. Manor Park in Glossop continues to be the flagship club for the BCGBA as it is still the only club with full Clubmark status in the game.

 

BCGBA ENDSLEIGH INSURANCE INTER COUNTY TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP

 

We were drawn in Section 3 of the Championship with Merseyside, holders Warwicks & Worcs and Potteries. We knew it was tough group with the holders and Potteries in the group along with Merseyside who have greens that can do damage to any County’s away side, as we had seen in the past. The first match was to be at a new green for us, Holbrook M.W., the weather was a major issue at this time of the year, we had the driest and warmest start to a season in my time as County Secretary. We had selected the green a month before the date of the match, expecting as we normally do that the start to the season tends to be wet and green’s heavier in our County, so we went to Holbrook as it is one of the quickest greens throughout the year. What we got was one of the quickest green’s I have seen at this time of year, dry sunny conditions exacerbated by a 40mph wind blowing across the green, conditions that made it that we had very little home advantage, despite all the help we had from the host club. Away in Merseyside the green was reported to be “friendly”. We started the home match on a green which by now was “alien” to our players as it was nearly unplayable as the wind battered jacks, bowls and players. We had the worst possible start as Jon Guess lost 9-21 to the enigmatic John Harnett junior swiftly followed by Richard Peach 13-21 to Danny Barwise, and that set the tone for the home leg, as we were always chasing the match. Brian Smith continued his winning sequence with a polished 21-13 win after putting probably the most practice in on the green. Steve Adams recalled down the order won 21-17 and it was not as bad a start as it could have been. Merseyside were using a new green for them as well, the Unison BC in St.Helens, but the “friendly” comment at this moment in time seemed to be far from the truth. John Marshall kept up his consistent play at this level losing 20-21 at No.1, but Brian Hill lost to 14 and Craig Shore to 13, but a superb win by Paul Hawker moved up the order to No.3 spot 21-15,kept us in the game and match. Back at Holbrook the wind was now making good players look silly, but we started to claw back the deficit as the ever consistent Dave May won 21-13, and Dave Alsop followed this with a 21-16 win we were just in front, at this stage at home, and the match with news from away gave the impression that it would be a tight finish. Gareth Nash gave probably his worst performance in a County shirt, as he never had control of the green, losing 13-21, but with his Littleover teammate and green specialist Matt Ford winning 21-15 over major handicap winner Dave McDermott we were definitely giving ourselves a chance. At St Helens we continued to struggle, Ian Johnson losing to 11, and unusually at this time of the season an out of sorts Darren Smith lost 11-21. However, Colin Leishman gave a Man of the Match winning performance in winning 21-7, but this was negated by the loss by Dominic Wheatcroft to 9, so we were behind in the match, but with good cards in the back 4 home and away we could still win. Neil 'Naz' Worthington, showed what a polished performer at this level he has become with a superb win 21-10, but again this negated by an out of sorts performance by Darren Carter as he lost 10-21 to Jamie Fitzpatrick, who couldn’t keep a bowl on the green in practice until he swapped for a small set of 2.4's. Andy Fearn was reveling in the pace of the green and even he was having major problems with the gusting wind, but one end was fatal. Away at Unison, we were doing alright but as their green was infinitely slower they finished 45 minutes after us after starting later, such was the speed of the Holbrook green. Paul Chamberlain lost 20-21 despite in his own words “not playing well", but doing the business with a solid score. Burbage’s Phil Clapham in as reserve had an excellent win 21-16, but Darren Shaw lost to 15, but with Andy Spragg coming in with an excellent 21-9 win at No.12 we had done miraculously well to lose by just 14. News came in that we had clawed a good result away so it was just down to the players on the green. Andy Fearn was 19-5 up at this stage and John Dewey 16-12 up, the end of Andy’s I refer to was where he lay one with a 6 foot bowl the opponent had one in the gutter and a 10 foot bowl to beat, Andy sent his second bowl which looked perfect 15 yards away from the opponents wood, but a tremendous gust of wind at this point caused it to pick up speed and pushed it off the green .The opponent got 2 more points, but it was all down last player on the green John Dewey, all he needed to do was win but at the very least score 2 more to tie and 3 to win the match. However it was not to be as John never scored again losing 9 shots on the bounce in probably the worst of the conditions. This meant we had won at home by 12 and lost by just 2 shots. Match 2 was back to the drawing board, and we chose to go to the Littleover No.1 green, but Warwicks & Worcs after losing their first game to the Potteries showed us the utmost respect and knowing they had to win to get back in the group took us to their No.1 green The George B.C. at Warley. My initial thoughts were that we needed to win by 45-50 at home and that proved a bad call, as it was not even close. The green at Littleover was like Holbrook not ,what we expected, as the blistering hot weather was making the green probably too fast, despite the watering the night beforehand again strange/alien to the home players. Steve Adams was restored to his coveted No.1 spot and he was paired with the “bouncy character” of Steve Freer, this was classic game when Adams broke away to lead 19-10 it looked as though we would have the best of starts, but Freer got back to 17, but still an excellent win. Brian Smith was having a rare old tussle  with Gareth Herbert (who took the Man of The Match award with this win), and it saw Brian’s long winning stretch go, by the slenderest of margins 20-21. Paul Stretton not having the best of season’s by his win admission, showed what a quality act he is by winning 21-10 and when Richard Gill on his recall to the Senior team making it a memorable one with a superb 21-12 win. We had made the best possible start. Away from home we were doing equally well, Richard Peach recovering from his mauling at Holbrook won with a classy 21-14, John P. Hall recalled to the team had an equally stunning 21-14 win, to set us on the way well and truly. However John Marshall never got to grips with the green and lost 9-21 this was followed by a 9-21 loss by Brain Hill, but remarkably we were in the lead overall. Back at Derby we were still doing well, Dave May won 21-20, and Calvin Jackson another recalled to action won 21-20, but Ed Furniss on his debut came up against Ant Bracken making his “umpteenth” appearance and lost 11-21. When Naz Worthington won 21-16 we were still holding the lead nicely at home, but the strong Warwick & Worcs was doing its job with no big losses. They are probably as good an away side as there is in the championship. Away from home the infamous green was now in full swing, as it began to produce the results for Warwicks & Worcs they were hoping for as the losses to 9 began to pile up, Phil Clapham lost to 9 as did Paul Hawker at no.5 & no.6 Jon Guess topped the rot a little with a very creditable toss to 20, but Matt Ford was the next victim to 9, so the match was well and truly running away from us, and the strange results at home continued as the green was totally an alien beast. Paul Chamberlain at one point was 16-3 down but fought back to get 17. John Dewey got back to winning ways and won 21-17, but the match was well and truly over as Andy Fearn lost to 17,and Dave Allsop straight off the plane from holiday in the morning, was only going to be a spectator, ended up playing and got 9 against Steve Darling. We decided against using Dan Petcher for his debut as we wanted him for the Alliance team who thought had a chance in that competition, but that was ended as he had to come in as reserve in the next game anyway. We just managed a narrow win at home by 6, 221-215. Away from home the carnage was complete, as we couldn't muster a winner, but both Ian Johnson and Andy Spragg used their experience to lose to 19 each, but lan Eaton lost to 6 and Daz Shaw lost to 13 to complete a miserable afternoon, arid we lost by 68 overall. The final match would be an attempt to win a game and try and get enough of a win to get into the Supplementary competition. Potteries had now won both their group games, but it was still wide open for the other 3 especially if we could beat Potteries, but on past experience this was a tall order as they have some superb home greens, and have underachieved for some time. We decided to go to Bolsover Colliery for the home leg, a green we have never lost on, and in the Potteries we would go to Silverdale, another stunning home green, where what looks down hill is actually up hill and vice versa, optically wrong, Potteries just needed to win to top the group. Things didn’t start well as usual at home, John Marshall was in all sorts of trouble at 16-5 down until one our reserves asked another player to go on the land that Barry Booth was using to have John in all sorts of trouble, John to get in and win 21-17. That player was Richard Peach, who did John the favour but then lost 14-21. Richard Gill started well, but then his opponent got in and started to play very well, and Richard lost to 16, as the Potteries players adapted to the green very well, personally I thought not enough weight change in the green on the day. Mac Backhouse was also down, leveled at 18 across, only for one of our players to get onto the mark he was using and he lost 18-21. At Silverdale the scene was set for the day, the heavy front order of the Potteries put them in pole position, Steve Adams had a rare reversal at no.1 losing 14-21, Brian Smith took a battering off Dean Ferris to lose 7-21, Matt Ford who plays some of his bowls in the Potteries lost 12-21, and Dave Allsop losing to 9, we were looking at damage limitation at home and away. Back at Bolsover, Calvin Jackson used his green practice and recent match on there to good use winning 21-13, Brian Hill having a rough season in the County lost 19-21, but lan Eaton in as reserve gave a good response to his mauling in Birmingham winning 21-13, and when John Hall won 21- 19, we had turned the tide at home. Away from home it continued to be a difficult task, Dave May lost to 14, and when Naz Worthington had a rare loss again to 14 it looked as though it was going to be a bad day at the office. However, Dan Petcher came in as the reserve away from home and what a time to make your debut, but showed remarkable composure to win 21-20 and win the man of the match award. This was swiftly followed by Gareth Nash’s return to form with a brilliant 21-12 win at Silverdale. Back at Bolsover, it was all about saving the home record, but Jon Guess managed to lose to 20, and then two 21-20 wins for lan Johnson and Daz Shaw, leaving Andy Spragg with the task of not losing, to retain the home record for the green and for the season. Andy duly obliged with a 21-13 and a narrow 234-220 win. Away from home we fought back really well, the ever consistent Paul Stretton showed his prowess and experience at this level with a 21-19 win, Andy Fearn another winner 21-20, offset by a 20-21 loss by John Dewey, and when Paul Chamberlain lost to 16,we had lost by 49 away from home, but the back 6 had shown excellent resilience to restrict the Potteries to this number. Yorkshire went onto win the title for the first time in a number of year’s beating Shropshire in the final, both will be in our group next year, hope our banker greens are back to something like for next season.

 

DRAKES PRIDE JUNIOR INTER COUNTY’ CHAMPIONSHIPS

 

We were drawn in group 4 ,the 3 County group, to play Cheshire and Cumbria. Our first match would be against Cheshire, who we had been informed were going through a player change ,having lost most of their squad from the last 2 seasons. At home we would go to the Barton bottom green for the first match, and away we would be Winnington Park No.1 green in Northwich. We started with a strong home side Conor Chamberlain winning 21-15 at No.1, the ever improving Lewis Belcher 21-10, Elliot Laboure of Netherseal 21-6 and Adam Morritt finishing off a clean sweep with a 21-7 win. Away from home it had been a strange 24 hours for Clive Thornhill and I as at 6pm the night before we had only 8 players, but thanks to club Secretaries and Martin Hartley we had 12 on the day and from where we had been on Saturday night in the depths of despair, it turned totally on the day. Adam Hartley now moved to No.1 beat the Cheshire No.1 on a big green 21-18,the first loss this Cheshire player had since making his debut 5 years before, Adam Hawker still coming to terms with County bowling lost to 16,the effervescent Neil Bothamley won 21-13, but the big green was not to James Pickering’s liking and he lost 7-21,but we were doing alright. Back at the much faster Barton green we were moving steadily through the gears, another fast improving player Hatton’s Jack Brooks won 21-9,and Alex Campbell a 21-17 winner the position to win big at home was secured. Luke McNeilly won 21-4 and the game was nearly over despite George Brood losing 20-21. Away it was a remarkable scene Ashley Bonnar won 21-14 at the important No.5 slot, Callum Briddon showing good improvement from last year to win 21-8.The story then got better as the first of the players who had been drafted in at very short notice went on the green, and the very young Luke Guess and equally young Bradley Bayliss showed excellent skill and panache to win 21-19 and 2 1-14 respectively. With the win securely sealed back at Barton, Cheshire started to have some success as Tom Brooks lost to 17 and Will Mosley to 7 and Darryl Matkin to 19, but with Liam Anguish’s 21-14 win this settled the ship for a 231-166 win. Over at Winnington the next of the Saturday night selections was on the green Sam Warwick who after a nervy start won comfortably 21-11. Kellie Hill never got to grips with the indifferent pace of the green and lost to 8, whilst Shelby Howard the last of the Saturday nighters won 21-17 in an excellent game. The final game was between Alvaston & Boulton’s Dan Hartley in his final year and another undefeated Cheshire player in his last season,  but Dan showing real class won 21-13, to give stunning win 220-190. We then missed the June game as Cheshire would play Cumbria, and our final game would be against Cumbria .Cumbria surprised many people when they beat Cheshire, but not us as we had seen their potential 2 seasons ago the last time we played them, and they had obviously continued to improve. The game would be a winner takes all place in the semi finals. We decided to go to Washlands No.1 green a good green for us in the past, and away we would go to North Scale BC on Walney Island in Barrow in Furness. On one of the hottest days of the year the greens at both venues were very quick. Though it was to be a tight battle. However, nerves were steadied when Lewis Belcher and Elliot Laboure both won to 7,which was added to with a 21-14 by Adam Morritt. At North Scale an excellent venue with a difficult green, things were not going our way, the bulk of the Cumbrian team was the same group we had seen 2 years ago, and they had continued to improved with 2 really good girl players in their team. Adam Hartley managed to get 18, in a brilliant game which was somewhat tainted by some of the worst refereeing decisions I have seen at this level, which had Adam all over the place for 5-6 ends as his concentration was broken as was his opponent, but as the rules say ”the referees decision is final" even if they are wrong, however he managed to recover and just lost to 19. Adam Hawker had difficulty with the quick sections of the green, but scrambled for 9 ,Neil Bothamley had a similar game struggling with the fast bit of the green and got 15. However James Pickering was relishing the fast slopes, and was unlucky to lose to 16, this was not going to be easy, as they had picked a very difficult green. Back at home we were still enjoying wins, as the strong front order was giving the best possible chance, Matt Fearn won to 14, and Alex Campbell won 21-10, and with Luke McNeilly coming in with a 21-12 win the game looked secure at home. Will Mosley then finished off the perfect start with a 21-13 win, and we were in pole position. However, this was still not going to be easy, as Ashley Bonnar got 18 away from home, now becoming a polished No.5, a far cry from his early nervous games, but this is what building a team is all about. Luke Guess started badly and was 11-1 down, but fought back well to get 11, but then we managed a win with a superb performance as Peakdale’s Callum Briddon won 21-15, and with Bradley Bayliss losing on the green 19-11, the home scores were going to be crucial. Bradley then fought back never giving up to show what potential he has by winning 21-20, under extreme pressure on and off the green. At Washlands the wins had ended when Lewis Johnson lost to Ayesha Wilson 15-21, and with Liam Anguish losing to 12, we were beginning to rock a little but Josh Hall then matched the 12 loss with a 21-12 win. lt only left Darrell Matkin to get the match at home finished off and see what we needed to get at Barrow, which he duly did and won 21-20 to give 236-172 win at home. Away from home the players had adopted a relaxed attitude thinking that they had already won, but this was soon changed when the results started to go away from us., and the match was tightening up all the time, as the two losses in the back four had not made it a runaway victory. First Sam Warwick lost to 9,and Kellie Hill only got 11, we were in danger of losing the match overall. Shelby Howard was scrapping to a precious 14, and this just left Dan Hartley needing to win his game to win the match overall. At one stage Dan was well in the lead only to be pegged back and then a tense finish saw the Cumbrian strike at Dan’s bowl at one end and hit his own bowl ,then Dan then clinched the tie with an excellent lead and we had got home by just 8 shots. This left us with a semi-final against holders Yorkshire. We rightly or wrongly took 2 of the more experienced players from the home leg ,as we knew it was going to be hard work at any Yorkshire venue, and it could be aggressive in a polite sort of way. We chose the top green at Barton BC, for our home venue, and we were taken to Almondbury Liberal Club in Huddersfield away. We were shocked away to hear that two of our selected players had to withdraw at a late time before the match had started, one being sick and trying to recover right up to the match, whereas the other one broke his nose in the morning, leaving 2 players to make their debut’s in the middle order. Despite this shock we started about the task very well, Conor Chamberlain with an excellent 21-10 win at No. 1,swiftly followed by 3 wins for Lewis Belcher and Matt Fearn to 19 and jack Brooks moved up the order to win 21-17. Away from home we were doing brilliantly on a very hard green, Adam Hartley lost 18-21 in a quality game, and when Adam Hawker now up to speed at this level winning 2 1-20 we were doing far more than expected Josh Hall just lost to 19 after being 19-15 up, when the crowd got at him, then Neil Bothamley lost to 20 and the large crowd was very quiet. l was stood with my friend Keith Hatzer the Yorkshire senior team manager, who said they had expected to be 35-40 up at this stage here and holding away but found themselves well and truly behind, and Keith being very impressed with our juniors at Almondbury. (An old football adage is when playing away from home, quieten the crowd and take them out of the equation and we certainly had done this). Keith had already said to the Yorkshire Juniors team managers here and away that Barton would be tough as he had been there with the Seniors when they had lost to us some years ago, and would not be the cakewalk they had had in the competition for the last 2 seasons. Unfortunately at home the loss of the 2 players in the middle order took its toll, making your debut is hard enough ,but in a semi-final against the best junior team in the competition was a big ask. Both Beth Fearn and Blake Skinner did remarkably well to get 9 each against seasoned Yorkshire players. Alex Campbell lost to 15 and Tom Brooks to 12, as the Yorkshire team showed their strength in depth. Away from home our young middle order would be hard pushed to hold the Yorkshire home team on paper, but Ashley Bonnar and a Yorkshire girl Ellis Owen played out the best game I had seen this year with Ashley just going down 20-21.Luke Guess made his usual slow start to his game going 12-1 down only to get is back to 13-10 before losing to 12.CalIum Briddon was just outplayed by the Yorkshire captain losing 10-21 pinching a few chalks at the end. The large Yorkshire crowd had now found it’s voice and aimed it at Bradley, but in another pure quality performance took the crowd on and won 21-17 ,with help from the vociferous Martin Hartley and other Derbyshire spectators. We were holding our own away, just needed 4 good wins at home and we would be in with a chance. Luke McNeilly just lost to 19 ,but the Yorkshire back 4 were doing their job as we had 3 wins for Elliott Laboure. Liam Anguish and Darrell Matkin 18,19 and 19 respectively, to leave us with a 209-226 toss at Barton. A tough ask away from home to get 4 wins ,but we gave it a go, but the match was virtually over when Aaron Gibson’s away match rustiness saw him get 11. James Pickering relishing the large noisy crowd did really well and was unlucky to lose 19-21.Shelby Howard showed what a good player she is going to be losing 20-21,and with Dan Hartley playing his last match for the juniors as he goes out on age ,but what a way to finish the only game on the green being 18-11 up pegged back to 18 across to then pull out a stunning toucher to go on and win 21-18 and keep his season’s unbeaten record along with Bradley. We lost by just 32 away 212-244. We lost this game by 32 away, but as Yorkshire has consistently put 130 plus points over every other team over the last 2 seasons as they did in the final against Warwick & Worcs, just shows what a remarkable team performance this has been for our Juniors, pity it wasn’t the final. Many thanks go to the 18 year olds we lose on the age barrier this year they have every right to feel proud of their time with the “Juniors”.

 

INTER COUNTY VETERAN’S TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP

 

The Championship was to be played at Centrevale Park in Todmorden, we had selected a 12 man squad but this was reduced to the minimum 8 on the day due to various withdrawals. On a day which was projected to be wet and windy turned out to be the hottest day on the year thus far in July. We were lucky enough to be drawn on the best of the 4 greens missing the horrid winter green, the other 3 were in really good condition. Our first opponents would be a strong Cheshire team and the first match up saw us against one of our old players and friends Noel Burrows up against Mac Backhouse making his debut at this level after his Senior career retirement the week before ,he was drawn against Noel. The game on the big green was a classic Noel leading 11-7 then 15-10, for Mac to get in and lead 17-15 and play two touchers up the hill at one end, only for Noel to play the perfect bowl and beat them both, and then go onto win 21-17. PhiI May another making debut at this level was just behind in the game all the way through and lost to 15. An out of sorts Dave Smedley lost to 19 as the green began to change from being covered in dew, to starting to pick up speed all over Graham Jackson scored a creditable 17 against the enigmatic and energetic Gerald Merry, and we desperately needed a win, which was supplied with polished performance from another first timer Phil Homer who won superbly 21- 8. Keith Whereby another new starter decided that the green was still heavy went 12-5 up but then lost 13-21 against the experienced Alan Maine. However Dave Redfern again first time out in the Vets won 21-15, leaving anchorman Keith Fandom to try and get a big enough win for overall victory, but his 21-20 win left us 4 short 144-148. The next opponents would be an equally strong South Yorkshire Parks. Phil Homer started this time and lost 14-21, but Mac Backhouse just got home 21-20, but Graham Jackson found the green much more difficult as the pace was increasing all the time the sun was climbing in the sky ,Graham got 12. Again we need to get wins to get back into the match. Keith Whereby got his head round the green this time and won 21-19,but this was offset by Dave Medley's loss to 19,Even though we had a good back 3 we didn’t make the large wins we needed as The Parks team was playing very well. Phil May got his first win with a 21-20 result as did Dave Redfern again 21-20,but Keith Fantom lost to 16 and the loss was 18shots. In the final game we took on Wales, but we could not progress to the next stage with the 2 losses as were the Welsh, who had lost by 1 shot against the Parks and 9 to Cheshire, so this was the wooden spoon game of the group. Mac Backhouse started us off with a superb 21-14 win, and then a 21-9 win by Phil Homer who had found his feet at this level very quickly. However an out of sorts Dave Smedley lost to 16, but put up spirited battles in all his games, The green was now like lightning, and Graham lost 7-21 so the match was just about level Keith Wharmby negated the loss by Graham with a 21-9 win, Keith Fantom cemented the lead with a 21-20 win. Phil May lost 21-11, but a 100% record was maintained in Dave Redfern’s game when Dave won 21-8 and the victory was secured by 17 shots. This was a relatively inexperienced team at this level, but it was also probably the youngest one we had sent to the over 6O’s competition, roll on next year when I think we will be in contention.

Continued on Secretary’s Report Page 2