SORRY AARON, I JUST RAN OUT OF STEAM...

Saturday 12th September

TARLETON BOWLING & SOCIAL CLUB

64 DOUBLES ONE DAY COMPETITION

Partnered with AARON HAYHURST
First Round: v GRAHAM HICKEY & DAVE SCOTT W 21-17
Second Round: v JAMIE SMITH & JORDAN RILEY W 21-18
Third Round: v GRAHAM OLIVER & BARRY WHALLEY W 21-17
Quarter- Finals: v STUART TIPPING & ANDY FLEMING L 19-21

Next up and Aaron had asked me if I fancied a doubles competition at Hesketh Bank a few weeks ago. Then with just a few days to go messaged me to say it was actually at neighbouring Tarleton. No problem, except I have never played at Tarleton - and nor had Aaron as it turned out!
With form dripping away recently I managed to find a mindset that this was a fresh a
start and certainly a blank canvas (or canvasses, with two different greens to negotiate if we made progress) I've played a couple of doubles comps with Aaron over the years when a little greener and without him expecting too much of me. Now I feel he believes in me and that I can believe in myself. No pressure as such, but an early exit would have been very disappointing.
We faced Yorkshire veterans Graham Hickey and Dave Scott in the first round. You don't travel from Halifax to West Lancashire for a 10am start unless you fancy your chances. On the smaller but much trickier front green, Aaron and I played fairly well and backed each other up. This was a tight game throughout, but going in to the teens we just managed to pull away and deserved it I felt.
Our second round opponents awaited in a fairly quick turnaround on the larger back green. Two young lads from Liverpool, Jamie Smith and Jordan Riley. Jamie with a distinctive mechanical delivery in which his arm angled wide of his body and was difficult to follow, Jordan a left-hander. We got off to a good start in this one which was key. It was looking quite comfortable at one point, but we had to ride out a comeback which we managed well really, limiting them to mainly singles. Once we broke their resistance, a few ends of nip and tuck later and we finished the job off. Frustrated Jordan kicked out a chunk of the all be it rotting wood of the gutter surrounds. I thought about my own temperament at times and realised it's just small potatoes in the grander scheme!
Back on the front green for a last sixteen match against Graham Oliver and Barry Whalley. I think it was Graham at the front and his excellent lead bowls had us under a lot of pressure. Barry at the back was never far away either and it began to feel like we had reached our tipping point for the day. 2-11, 4-14, we were really struggling with little more than damage limitation to play for. But as expressed many a time previously, crown green bowls and particularly doubles is one funny old game indeed.
I managed to lead out well for a few ends and we had a little run which seemed to settle us down a bit and particularly Aaron who started to find some belters from the back. My leads then went completely off for a few ends, but Aaron kept up the standard and eventually we fought back in to the business end of this game at 16-17 which was some feat in itself. Typically, we then had a shocker of an end. Graham and Barry were holding three with Barry's final bowl potentially sewing the match up. There seemed little danger from their point of view, but somehow we got knocked in for one and we couldn't believe our luck. A sucker punch for our opponents who must've been wondering just how the hell this game was now seventeen-across. I then sent a cracking lead next end which survived to count and we were ahead. I then decided on taking a mark we hadn't played before and although straight peg on to the big crown here, it wasn't straightforward. I managed a length with my lead, if two feet to the left. Graham couldn't beat it, Aaron sends a good one to make two, then sends an even better one and we are actually lying game. Unusually, Barry's adjustment doesn't make the danger zone and we won it. We didn't quite know ourselves how we came out on top in this game and walked off the green giggling to each other like cheeky schoolboys, but we did it and a quarter final beckoned.
Stuart Tipping and Andy Fleming were next up in the last eight. County players and you wouldn't expect to be facing anything less at this stage of a competition. Aaron and I got off to a reasonable start and it was tit for tat for a while, but I think we both began to believe we could do it and get past these two. As we made a little break in to the lead, Aaron then gave me instructions to chuck long in to the corners as Stu wasn't quite reaching at this time. It made sense, but still up front I wasn't very comfortable with it and corner bashing is an aspect of my game that still requires a lot of improvement. It was working though, mainly because Aaron was finding a length bowl or two with our opponents not much more comfortable about it than I was. We stretched out to 17-11 with the momentum and on the cusp of a quite unthinkable (for me, at least) semi-final place. But then I didn't send the jack as deep as required and Fleming licked it with a toucher. Having said that, we still pushed on to 19-14 and just needed a good end or two. But my game particularly just dropped off a cliff at this point and I was now leaving Aaron with too much to do on his own against these two. I got really frustrated and lost sense of the situation. Perhaps I just ran out of steam and the ability to concentrate. Andy Fleming's unsporting sniggers got under my skin. I just lost my way in the match. We had a swap round but that didn't help either. Stu was now up front for them and came in to his own with perfect timing, leading really well to see out a comeback and win the match. My last two bowls were nowhere.
The disappointment from this match resonated with me like no other. Partially a feeling of letting my partner down - that short jack - and when just a couple of decent woods fom somewhere could have got us over the line at some point. This one really hurt, we were so close to a semi-final here. I know Aaron felt the same.
Rolling back to 10am that day, two lads who've never played here before and I'm pretty sure we'd have taken playing four games and reaching the quarter-finals. We did have that large portion of luck served up in round three, but you need a bit of that. We should have nailed this one when we had the chance and gone a step further.
It would have set up what for me would have been a second meeting against Darren Edgerley in a week, with Darren having got to the semis with Tim Hodges. But the Tipping and Fleming combination got past them, only to lose out against elite pairing Simon Coupe and Josh Mordue in the final.

*FLEMING STICKS IN MY THROAT 

Did Andy Fleming really snigger/scoff from behind me a couple of times when I sent some terrible deliveries in the latter half of this match?

I actually think he did. Just about loud enough to think you heard it, yet quiet enough to doubt and not confront him about it at the time.
Although I don't know Fleming well at all, it's fair to say that prior to this match I've never warmed to the fella. I find his demeanour to be somewhat on the smug side. I've entered a few of the competitions he runs over the years and found little in the way of personable attributes from him. He's got time for bowlers his own standard and above, whilst the rest of us are just jokers making up the numbers. That's the sort of impression I gathered.
It would make sense that I did hear what I thought I heard. 
May I reiterate a point that I made a few years ago that belittling those below your own grade in sport or any walk of life really, is very poor form. For that, I should go on record as thinking Andy Fleming to be a rather undesirable creature indeed.