State Pairs 2009

February 1, 2009

A happy group of players after the game where we see the winners and Runner up having their pic taken after their game

------------L/R; Scott Edmonds Greg Reagan Ron Bates and Nick Reagan



The Composite side of Scott Edmonds and Ron Bates won the State Pairs final today at Osborne Park against the Sth Perth combination of father and son Greg and Nick Reagan.
Both sides had come thru a very tough field to make it to play in this final.
Scott and Ron had beaten Clive Adams, Rhett Butler, Matt Ellul and Gordon Jones. As you can see there is plenty of quality in that group .

Greg and Nick also had a hard road to contend with, Steve Lunn, Matt Mitchell, Daniel Wood and Anthony Provost. The bowl of the decade was required against Anthony Provost to win the game and Nick produced that bowl

Greg Reagan played well in a hard game

So with the stage set it was game on and Scott/Ron soon shot out to a 5/0 lead after 5 ends. Nick/Greg were playing super bowls but could not get the shot. No matter the position either Ron as lead/three or Scott would change the situation if it was against them.

It seeemed that Ron/Scott just always had the edge in this high class game . End 9 produced a lot of magic by both sides where the shot changed 7 times with the correct weight being applied to the players shots. That end went to Nick and Greg and for all that effort they got one shot.



Ron Bates seemed to be a tad in front of Greg Reagan, they were having a great tussle
While Nick was very good but no matter what in the close heads he could not get the shot and when he did it was matter of whether he could keep it.
Scott was probably the best of the four of the players with his wonderful weight control.





this was a grinding hard slog for the players and the spectators, it was a particuarly slow game to watch and difficult to concentrate on it because the players of both sides were taking far to long to bowl and were following every bowl they played to the head, it seemed spectators were watching more talking and walking up and down than the actual playing of the bowls.
For all the skills that were on display and they were high class skills it wasnt a good spectacle to watch because of the extremly slow play

Anyway Ron/Scott were simply too good when it was tough with ultra tight heads and it seemed apparent that they would win the match because they were always close to the action.
The score moved out to be 16/6 on the 15th end in favour of Ron and Scott. Then up to 18/7 on the 18th end. Nick killed the ends 3 times at that score and it paid off to a degree because we saw a mini comeback by father and son when they picked up two fours and lost the game 18/15.

Overall Ron Bates played a superb game as the lead and third and shaded Greg who also played an impressive game. Scott Edmonds was briliant and Nick Reagan showed his considerable talent on many ocasions.


Ron Bates and Scott Edmonds hug one and other after their magnificent win
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