END OF TERM REPORT 2023

This third season of crown green has been the real learning curve on many levels. I think the way I play and approach the game now has been thoroughly enriched for the better by this Summer's highs and lows.
Some tough games for my club teams in the leagues and some harsh lessons dealt, but also some flashes of what I can do when arse and head are in gear together.
More games could have been won than allowed to slip away and that's something to put right next year. More difficult to beat though than previous seasons, I would say.
One of the most challenging aspects of this term was a mid-season confidence crisis. The frustrations of such, culminating in to one big petulant breakdown after a poorly contested and second consecutive home defeat in late June.
"You've gotta go there to come back", wrote the Stereophonics back in 2003 and in life, in bowls, there is a profound truth in that line. 

Since getting my knickers in a twist back then, rebooting with a clean slate has reinvented my bowling anima in a way and slowly helped piece my game back together.
There's still been some setbacks and rough defeats, but I've taken losses with much more grace and analysed them in a frame of mind based more on matter of fact. Since recognising that it's poor performance rather than negative results that encourages my demons to come to the fore, I've concentrated on just trying to play the next end better. It's actually all you can do in this game!
In the leagues, many ups and downs but overall, just about recording more wins than defeats. Monday night in the Chorley League wasn't easy getting in to the side and I felt a pressure when I did, given our team were seeking a second successive promotion. In the Leyland League on Thursday's, some experience of being last on the card, often getting the toughest draws. Although enjoying being relinquished of that pressure for the final four games, I'd happily give it another go next term if captain Harry feels it's suitable. I think I'll be able to handle it better next time around. 

Singles competitions didn't go so well and I capitulated at the local ones. Two decent efforts against top quality players at Fleetwood Waterloo though, and last week's showing at Longridge left things on a positive note.

A singles competition rethink for next season will be only entering ones that don't break a tenner, with the exception of the Waterloo. I'll continue to support the New Waterloo at Fleetwood. It may seem a bit of a journey and poor value for money if you go out first round, playing off five for fifteen quid. But it's the historic FA Cup of crown green and the surface of the Euston Green venue is improving all the time. I enjoy playing it.
But then of my four Waterloo appearances so far, three of my first round opponents have included Lee Johnstone, Greg Smith and Dan Petcher. Those in the know would agree that's not exactly much luck of the draw. But you pay for the experience and it's all more time spent on that green and hopefully next year a kinder first round draw, with a fair chance of round two.
The match against Greg Smith was surreal and it felt so at the time. I think I'd caught him a little bit rusty early season which is why he took longer than he should have done to despatch me. Although I didn't play badly at all.
As the season progressed I think it's fair to say Greg has been crown green bowling's most outstanding player, winning a long list of big competitions and ultimately lifting the Champion of Champions trophy with some authority. One of the best of all time for sure and the opportunity to play against him remains the absolute stand-out memory of the season.
In doubles meanwhile, a growing understanding and unexpected fondness of the pairs game. In competitions, more tough draws and valuable experience against highest quality Yorkshire players, Chris Mordue and Gary Wike, also top Lancashire pairing and Waterloo Doubles winners, Mike Opie and Steve Anderton. Not forgetting Kevan Shaw and Ben Phillips in Fox Lane Winter Doubles very early on in the year... I've shared a mat with some fantastic players of the game during 2023. 
In club doubles, two competitions won in succession with Vernon Robinson on the Jolly Members Day and then Barry Wright to lift the Tim Robinson Trophy.
For all the good, bad and ugly about this season, my state of mind for the game feels like it has evolved and the latter half of the Summer has felt much more positive. Proof will most definitely be in the pudding of 2024, but I feel better equipped already for next year's bowling challenges. 

Now there's more time to concentrate on running and earmarking a few races over the Autumn and Winter.
It's back to just a once-a-week fix of bowls in the Fox Lane Winter League. Intent on improving my doubles game further and feeling I've got much more to offer come next Spring.  

WET WIN FOR A FEEL GOOD FINISH

Monday 2nd October 2023
LONGRIDGE AUTUMN FLOODLIT SINGLES
At Longridge Cons
First Round Qualifying
v MARK IRELAND W 21-16 (Off 3-3)

Some intrepidation about this final fling at knock-out singles this year, but I needn't have worried as I found myself playing well here and actually getting through a round for the first time this season.
I was briefly graced with the company of the one and only Alan Hodson Snr, joining me for practice which definitely helped keep a smile on my face and stay relaxed. Alan then scored my first match and gave me good encouragement as I took an early lead and kept hold of it with some good lead bowls and decisive spoilers against Mark.
The rain didn't stop all evening and perhaps a stiffer green was a bit of a leveller, but I found a decent length instantly in that first round match and grew in confidence. Mark did put some good ones up to keep himself in it, notably a very good two to draw nearer at 18-16, but I broke back straight away and saw the game out over the next two ends.
Moaning about playing after work as I have done, with jaded senses, I don't work Mondays and played much better. I wasn't exactly sat on my backside all day and had an eight mile run on the West Pennine moors under my belt in the afternoon as well, but I think it shows that as much as it is an excuse, it's also an unavoidable fact that I play better with a fresher mind and body. League matches on a Monday night have generally provided better performances and results than rushing to get there drained after a day's nonsense at work on a Thursday. That's how it is and I need to find a way to deal with it somehow.
After getting through, organiser John Hanson hands me a card to mark. It's Mick Coupe's opening match and he provided me with a fine example of how to squeeze out a good opponent on this green.

Second Round Qualifying
v JOHN PHILLIPS L 15-21 (off 3-3)

It can be a small world on the bowling circuit and next up was a rematch with Darwen based John who took me to the cleaners in the first round at the Chorley Subs Open back in May.
Faintly, a resigned feeling at not playing somebody else new, but also a determination to do better against this chap and show him I'm not a complete pushover.
John must be a renowned slow starter, for I recall winning the first few ends at Chorley and tonight he came back from 11-19 down to win his first round match before I got a great start once again, going five or six up before John got going, messing up my good bowls and sending better quality ones himself. Unlike our previous meeting though, I was a very slow burn. Very few two's conceded, I was there or there abouts on most ends and maybe unlucky a few times not to break his runs with the jack more frequently. 

This was a much closer game, 11-11 at one point. But an end or two later I wastefully threw the jack off and despite rolling an excellent lead to where John sent it, he sent a real peach of a shot that sort of stamped his ever so slight authority from that moment onwards. It was another long run of singles that slowly got my opponent to the threshold of victory first.
My last wood didn't have to be brilliant to save, but down the dip towards the far right corner where John had already taken some points, my last wood was just too strong and I bowed out gracefully I like to think.
John's a good player. Maybe next time. 

All in all a good night of bowling and feeling better about it as my season drew to it's close. 

SLOPPY MISTAKES PROVE COSTLY

Thursday 28th September 2023
SABDEN FLOODLIT SINGLES
First Qualifying Round
v BYROM OATES (Blackburn) L 18-21

Having made a decent account of myself here last year, I was always going to come back for more at this cracking little club beneath Pendle's shadows.
Something just wasn't quite clicking tonight though, whether mentally worn out by the euphoria of a certain doubles match the previous evenings or the usual excuse of rushing over here straight from work, perhaps even stuck in a rut of resignation that I only turn up for such occasions to go out in the first round anyway?... Who knows, but I just wasn't as switched on as I should have been.
I know so because the competitive fires didn't blaze when I made sloppy mistakes. I should have been fuming with myself, but wry smiles and shoulder shrugs of mild disappointment were the order of the evening. No bad thing, for I've been trying hard not to flip my lid since those moments of Mid-Summer madness, but I still need an edge about me and it just wasn't there.
Young Byrom was a decent player and I'd be surprised if he didn't know this green better than I did. It took a few ends to suss out his left handed delivery which seemed to sweep across himself and this lefty was a difficult one to follow for this particular righty.
Having lost the first four ends to trail 0-6 and Byrom cutting little slack, I finally landed one and put a decent run together to come back and lead 8-6.
I broke my own momentum at this point with a foolish jack placement that I struggled with and cheaply conceded my lead. This lifted Byrom and he started to pull away by four or five until I had another little run to come back to 16-17. Once again I sent the jack further than I intended, down the sloping corner at the clubhouse end and didn't learn from my poorly judged and overshot first bowl as my second trickled away to join the other.

Byrom's winner wasn't that near either, but he won it on weight. He sends us across the clubhouse and lands a perfect front toucher. I try to send a saver but my land was too high. Byrom then sends another great wood, but disturbs his first which actually gives me a great chance and a target if I can tap onto something, but once again I inexplicably pushed my wood too high and I really was a bit annoyed with myself there. An opportunity spurned and now trailing 16-20, I felt I'd basically chucked my chances away.

Byrom leads out well again with a near toucher and had every right to expect that to be the winner. But I was very close with my first, so sent the second bowl down the same road with more pace and it was a hell of a match saving shot, knocking Byrom's out cleanly and leaving myself two.
Even then though, it didn't give me a fist-pumping lift for some reason. I should've been buzzing and focused on ceasing the moment. Instead, I rush things without thinking properly and once again sent that jack too far and towards the clubhouse side. This time I didn't reach, my best bowl was a ridiculous yard and a half away. Byrom also succumbed to going short with his first, but as I fully expected, found good length with his second to finally win it.
Disappointed because my opponent did give me chances here but I didn't take them. Byrom probably struggled to work me out, my game flickered from good to bad throughout and ultimately the bad cost me a real chance of making a bit of progress.
He won his second round match by the same score before going down to one of the evening's favourites for qualification on the deciding third round.
I really need to find an edge going in to the last bit of singles action of the year at Longridge next week. I'm not consistent enough for this level and I know this, but I can do a bit better in these competitions if I can at least have a bit more belief and turn up with the right head screwed on.