The Centre Men’s Open singles was played on artificial greens this season, which probably accounted for the absence of a number of leading players. Our men were not deterred. Ten entered but most fell by the wayside on the qualifying day and only Shoota, Neville and John Adams got to play on the Sunday. Shoota went out in the first post-section game beaten by former club member Trevor Tuatara but Neville won his way through to the last 16, and John got there by virtue of a first round bye. However, neither Neville nor John could advance further and when the the final was played on the Monday it was Andrew Johnson from Waikanae who took out his third Centre singles title at the expense of Peter Shepherd from Central with Andrew winning 21-12.
Grahame Law, Peter Brown and I played our qualifying games at the Kapiti club. It was some time since I had played there and I was impressed with the quality of their Greenweave carpet green which played very true and with good speed throughout the day and also with their organization and clubrooms. Personally I was disappointed not to qualify. I won a tight first game with Nicky Morgan from Central (a very promising young player) but lost my second to Peter Shepherd 14-21. That left both Paul Howell from Taupo (but formerly of the Kapiti club) needing to win our final game to qualify. I have played Paul a number of times and the score is pretty even. This game followed the pattern. At 19-20 down I was right in the game but Paul put his first two bowls right on the jack on what turned out to be the last end and two of my draws, a run and a drive later they were still there – so it was a DNQ and back to Levin early. Ah well. Maybe next year.