Greens heating up
Pressure building as finals near
THE finals have come three weeks early in Geelong-Ballarat Premier bowls, with Eastern Park, Lara and Sebastopol playing for their seasons as each week unfolds.
Eastern Park produced a stunning nine-shot win over top side Bareena on Saturday to maintain a one-point break in fourth spot over Lara, which beat Victoria by 24 shots, with Sebastopol seven points back in sixth spot after its 29-shot win over Buninyong.
But the pressure ramps up next week when Eastern Park — unbeaten since Christmas — hosts Lara and Sebastopol hosts Bareena.
Beyond next week Eastern Park has winnable games against Victoria and Highton so victory over Lara should lock it in for finals.
Lara and Sebastopol meet in round 17 with Lara facing a daunting task against Queenscliff in the final round, while Sebastopol should beat Victoria.
Put simply all three teams will be thinking they need a clean sweep from the final three rounds to play finals.
At the top end, Bareena’s fivepoint break over Ocean Grove — and even the 15-point gap over thirdplaced Queenscliff — is suddenly looking shaky.
As well as the tricky road trip to Ballarat to face a desperate Sebastopol next Saturday, it then runs into Queenscliff at home and Ocean Grove away to round out the season.
While Bareena should be too strong for Sebastopol, there will be much soul-searching in Noble Street this week after it entered the weekend 20 points clear on top.
Eastern Park spokesman and coach Nathan Bush was very impressed with his side’s improvement over recent weeks which has come on the back of a block of practice sessions during the Christmas break, prompted by its disappointing start to the season.
He had set a plan for games and development to get them to where they are now.
Bush said his team executed the plan well across the four rinks right from the start on Saturday and had a good lead at the break.
Bush encourages his skips to take chances when they pop up during a game, with Stewart Williams a prime example, playing big weighted shots when he needed to fix a deficit in the head.
For the most part it succeeded and he managed a three-shot win over Brannon Shelton.
Ocean Grove won three rinks against Highton on Friday night under lights, with its only loss being a one-shot thriller where Highton’s Jeremy Fitzgerald beat Tony Joel.
Newly identified to play for Victoria, Ocean Grove skip Leigh McIlvenny was exceptional with his bowls on a carpet he had not played on previously, especially with delicate draws into tight heads to get a shot or add to the count, winning 30-17 in the end.
The night games this season have been welcomed by both players and spectators with games at Queenscliff, City of Geelong and Highton.
Lara also is capable of hosting these games.