Two former champions fail to make knockout rounds of national singles

BOWLS

AUCKLAND: Two of the past four winners of the men’s singles have fallen short of the knockout rounds at the National Lawn Bowls Championships in Auckland.

2017 champion Dean Elgar (West End) and Taylor Horn (Mangere), who won the men’s singles when it was last staged at Carlton Cornwall two years ago, failed to register the three wins required to advance to postsection play yesterday.

Elgar was the first to be eliminated after he recorded backtoback defeats at Mt Wellington, while Horn followed him out of the nationals after he was beaten 2120 by Commonwealth Games bronze medallist Aidan Zittersteijn (Paritutu) in the fourth and final round at Howick.

The pair were the biggest casualties of section play in the men’s singles.

Defending champion Andrew Kelly (Canterbury 2017) and past winners Mike Kernaghan (North East Valley), Shannon McIlroy (Stoke) and Gary Lawson (Elmwood Park) have all qualified with perfect records, as have rising stars Ray Martin (Victoria), Sheldon BagrieHowley (Gore), Aiden Takarua (Pt Chevalier), Finbar McGuigan (Stokes Valley) and Seamus Curtin (Stokes Valley).

Women’s singles champion Nicole Toomey is out of the running in the pairs.

Toomey and Tannith Potgieter have been beaten 1511 by Denise West and Caroline Dubois in the sixth and final round of qualifying at Te Atatu to fall one win short of securing a place in postsection play. —RNZ