SATURDAY’S Bowls Sunraysia pennant preliminary final between Ouyen and Irymple to be played at the Irymple Bowls Club will be a very tough encounter.
Having played each other three times in home and away games, the Suns hold a slight advantage having won two of the three encounters.
A check of the match results provides a very clear picture. The Suns have 6.5 rink wins out of nine and are 31 shots up.
Their most recent encounter at the Cauldron, where they saluted by 27 shots with an all rinks win, would signal that the hosts will start favourites.
There will be no second chance available to the loser and both sides will be full on to make the main event next Saturday.
Ouyen are a solid unit. Norm Latta, Alan Crook, Mick Donaghy and Harry Munro are high level performers who enjoy nothing better than a solid scrap with a worthy opponent.
All are strong draw shot bowlers and if the Two Blues front half can get their team off to a good start then Ouyen have a real chance to give the Suns a shake.
Irymple’s Graeme Lynch and David Gray head up the two top spots on the Division 1 player’s ladder for the season and are much of the reason as to why the Suns are up and about.
The will need to bring their A games when they face-off against the Two Blues.
In Division 2, Mildura will host Irymple at the complex in Cureton Avenue. The Mildura unit have won two of their three home and away encounters, with an overall six rinks to three win/loss ratio.
However, the Suns have outscored the Magic 203 shots to 199.
The Magic will start favourites at home. Irymple finished the season full of beans and narrowly missed displacing the Magic from second spot on the ladder, finishing just three points behind them in third place.
The Sun’ propensity to score indicates that they will be hunting from the get go tomorrow and will be looking for Ian McLean, Phil Newton, Ian Kellett, George Millward and Chris Scott to provide the impetus.
Their opponents, Mildura have a lot to play for as they try to find a place in the grand final to defend their ’23-24 premiership win.
Reg Gardner has been the Magic’s best individual performer with Chris Richards, current Bowls Sunraysia Singles Champion of Champions Judy Osborne and Ken Yeowart all on the board to provide the impetus for the home side.
This match-up will be a real contest from the get go. The Magic to start slight favourites.
The Third Division prelim will be an interesting match-up. Mildura were left wondering what might be after their 60 shot shellacking at the hands of Wentworth in last week’s second-semi.
First aid for shell-shock has been administered and a little bit of magic woven into their practice regime this week.
The Euston Bandits produced a solid performance last week against Underbool producing a well-constructed 20 shots, all rinks win.
Saturday’s final will see the Bandits bring their strongest side to the contest with Doug Brown, Glenn Scott, Tony Scott and Phil Cattanach all on call.
Mildura will have few options to make changes as all five teams are still alive in finals, with only the top side having a rest this week.
Magic skips will be looking for a lift from last week’s efforts. Chris Barry, Allan Jones and Dennis Lloyd will be on home turf and will look forward to the greens at Mildura running a tick over 15 seconds.
Both sides have recorded a win in the home and away match-ups on their home deck. This will be one of the tightest finals on offer and the Magic at home will start slight favourites but the Bandits have a solid chore and will take the contest up to the home side.
Fourth Division will see Mildura make the grand final one way or another as Mildura 4 verses Mildura 5.
Four lost to Coomealla last week in a disappointing performance. Five outpointed Irymple in the elimination final after an extra end was required to get the Magic across the line in a real thriller.
Both Mildura sides contain some extreme youth. Jimmy Presley-Barwick leads in the Magic 4 side and Jace Dunstan, a Year 5 student leads in the Magic’s 5 side. These two young guns can produce solid bowls and will be keen to impress.
Looking across the results this season in both home and away games the Magic 4 side have defeated Magic 5, winning on all rinks and finishing 35 shots the better. It is hard to go past the Number 4 side, but finals pressure can produce some interesting results. Go Magic.
