SABDEN NIGHT FEVER

20/9/22
SABDEN FLOODLIT SINGLES
At Sabden Bowling Club

'Sabden Night Fever' would be one of my poorest puns yet for a heading I must admit, but this was one of the best nights of crown green bowling I've experienced so far.
The evening's expectations were surpassed and wildest dreams were almost achieved.
I travelled to Sabden with a positive frame of mind, knowing full well I may be setting myself up to fail. But I came away thinking perhaps I really can do this eventually and got over-excited about how far I can push my game over the next few years.

First Qualifying Round
v MARK OWENS (Westhoughton) W 21-13

A good start could have been even better. Having won the first few exhanges to go 3-0 up, I then commit a clanging schoolboy error. I send a perfect touching lead, only for Mark to go so wayward something was up - and it was - I'd told him the wrong peg! Fortunately my opponent saw the funny side.
Despite this breaking up that early momentum, I didn't beat myself up and self-destruct, but Mark had a good spell to come back to lead 5-7. Things remained pretty tight with neither of us able to keep possession of the jack for more than a few ends.
I was happy with the way I was playing though and as during practice, was enjoying Sabden's green. Dew was setting and bowls needed a bit of a push which can be a leveller and I was giving Mark a decent game.
At about the stage of being evenly poised at 10-10, I started to pull away and was landing some decent two's which can really do some damage in a short space of time. I got a huge flush of confidence from this and more than just believing I could win, I was absolutely wired up and intent on seeing this out. 19-12 became 20-12... then a slight slip up and a fluttering fear of a fightback. Mark then sends the jack long round peg towards a corner with two not easy to beat, but after fluffing my first bowl well short, my second had substance and ran on close to count.
Pie and peas from the lovely ladies in the clubhouse next, for I'm going to be staying a while longer.


Second Qualifying Round
v STEVE ANDERTON (Accrington)  L 17-21

Whilst shifting pie and peas I thought back to July in Fleetwood when I got through a tournament round. I let self gratification get the better of me and went in to round two having lost a little focus and maybe overly relaxed when going six down off three ends and giving myself a mountain to climb.
This time I was trying to keep my match head on and was ready to go. 

I seemed to think I'd heard of Steve Anderton one way or another, probably seeing his name in competition results and later discovered he plays top flight bowls in the East Lancashire leagues and has undoubtedly played at Sabden a good few times. That said, I've played a blinder here just giving the mon a good game.
I got off to a good start - a very good start - sending tight leads to go 4-0 up. Steve gradually broke up the deficit but I was competing, limiting him to singles and as we edged in to double figures I got a couple ahead again and was really starting to think I had a big chance of another win.
A couple of raggy ends with Steve pegging short across the roadside end cost me that lead though (Note to self: I should've asked for long tapes on one of these, we were barely halfway across the green) and then he got on a break playing long to the entrance corner and back. Very good bowls sent from Steve, increasing in precision each end.
I was struggling to suss out these marks, although landing enough to save a few twos and slow Steve's surge towards the finish line. At 12-16 I was very unlucky a couple of ends, missing out by an inch and harshly in my view, the score rolls over to 12-19.

Back to the entrance corner and even further away to the edge of the green, Steve sends yet another two very good ones quite close. My first is on track but well short, my second has substance though and I could tell straight away it might have something to say. It looked like I got bloody close and as I approach Steve has already asked for measures... and I'm in, at last!
This was bowls on another level for me and was one of a good few shots I can't quite believe I pulled off on the night.
I had the jack back in my hand and had a run to take four points before Steve got back in, when once again he is holding game and his second bowl taps the jack and sits pretty. Somehow though I found the perfect shot and won on a measure. 17-20. I'm still in it.
Next end and I'm a bit annoyed with myself, straight peg and perfect length but eight inches to the right. At this level such margins are easily mopped up and sure enough Steve lands one alongside the jack. All I can do is try and knock him out, the line looked good, the weight looked good, "I don't like this", my opponent says, but my bowl remarkably just dipped underneath on arrival with both of us wondering quite how that happened.
That was it then, but Steve's a very good player and I was chuffed to give him a game and especially claw back in to it when it looked like curtains in the long corners.
In the immediate wake of defeat, a strange glow of satisfaction as I contemplated what could have been, recalling instances of the match that cost me precious points... then I see Steve's next opponent in the third round for a place in finals night... crown green's top player Callum Wraight... and then I'm thoroughly gutted!!!
Callum was on the same qualifying night as myself again and this time I'd loved to have played him. Already well oiled with two games behind me and having earned the right to play him rather than simply paying the fee and getting the big draw.
It would have been a dream ending to a really enjoyable night's bowling. Unfortunately it wasn't quite to be, but tantalisingly close.


SABDEN IN MY SOUL
The village of Sabden sits in the southern basin of Pendle Hill's expanses and is one of many such rural settlements for which I have a soft spot. 

I've run hundreds of miles over Pendle's mass and even though I've not been up there for three years or so thanks to injury, global pandemics and the varying sheep population deterring us from taking the dogs, there's not much detail I've forgotten up there. This latest visit has inspired me to get my fell running shoes on and get up there again sometime soon.
Aside from fell races and training runs skirting above Sabden's impressive geography, my last sporting endeavour in the village itself was about twenty-five years ago when I played on Sabden FC's lush, but sloping pitch.
A Leyland Red Rose player back then, we were hoping to cause an upset in the Lancs Adidas Shield. Slope in our favour, we gallantly trailed 2-3 at half-time. Playing against their notorious gradient after the break, we got bamboozled and would "f*ck off back t' smoke" - as our captain Paul Sweeney so eloquently put it - with tails between our legs going down to a 3-7 defeat.
The whole 2022 bowling experience proved to be far more pleasurable than the second half of that 1996 cup match.