Mid-season already... Match report, 2nd July

Ask Allan!

Allan

In past articles, we have discussed how to approach the mat and what to check for before we bowl, the bias of the bowl, your aiming point, feet placement.

Delivery

There are three things to be aware of when delivering your bowl. Firstly do not bring your arm across your body, after you have let go of the bowl you must continue your arm movement into a follow through with your arm up to about your shoulder height - don't raise your head until the bowl is well on its way.

Secondly, standing on the mat, eyes on the aiming point, visualize how your bowl will curve towards the jack - do not let your eyes wonder to the jack. Relax, keeping your body and arm square to the aiming line, move your bowling arm backwards - which is the back swing - in a straight line, no lateral movement, and remain looking at the aiming point. As you move your arm forward, step forward with your lead leg placed adjacent to the aiming line. (RH player is your left leg, right leg for a LH player).

Finally, keeping your arm straight to affect a pendulum action, the point of release is at the lowest point of the swing at the 6 O'clock position next to the lead foot. This happens whilst you are keeping your eye on the aiming line, keeping your hand square to the aiming line at the point of release. To complete the bowling process you must continue with the bowling action, with your bowling arm following through to about shoulder height with the palm of your hand facing upwards as if you are catching raindrops. You should finish in a balanced position body and head square to the aiming point, until the bowl is well under way.

I have laboured the point about keeping your eyes on the aiming point, because your arm will automatically follow your eyes. As with moving your arm across your body as you bowl, the effect is the bowl will go under the jack. So, remember to keep eyes on the aiming point.

Wendy demonstrating delivery

Both Wendy and I are only too happy to give you a bit of coaching, or answer any queries you may have on AUTOMATICALLY CORRECT DELIVERY.         

Allan Shattock

Coming soon!

Pink Ladies!

We have a women's event coming up on 24th July at 2pm, followed by a cream tea. Open to all - members, feel free to bring friends and neighbours for a fun and interesting afternoon.

Click here to find out more.

This week's match report

North 1A team away to Clevedon B, 25/06/26

A humid sunny afternoon, with the occasional breeze at Clevedon top club was the challenge as the A team took on Clevedon B. The green was perfect for an afternoon of quality bowling by both sides, and two of our three rinks got off to a good start.

At nine ends we were treated to ice lollies in the shade and then went looking for the win. The Captain's rink had an excellent game, with all four playing well - notably Bob Grant, Dave Williams and Trevor Burnett on his birthday. A 28-7 result was enough to win the overall match 65-47.

The other two rinks, skipped by Phil Villis and Alan Shattock, had a mixed ending, going down by one and two shots on the last end. Phil's rink pulled it back from a poor start to one shot whilst with only three ends to go. Alan's rink, winning comfortably at that stage, dropped a six. That’s bowls for you!

Banwell A 65 8 points Clevedon B 47 4 points

H F Guckian

Captain of the day

North 2B team at home to Ashcombe C, 25/06/26

Firstly, a big thank you to both Kim and Janis for standing in when we were two short in the B team. Ashcombe C had two ladies listed in their team as well. However, one didn’t turn up leaving them one player short and resulting in a 25% loss on one rink.

The game started off in perfect weather and the rinks looking nice and green, despite being sun baked for the last week. Rink 2 skipped by Harry started off increasing the score slowly, picking up ones and the odd 2 until the 11th end, picking up a 5 and yet another 5 on the 16th end, finishing with a 23 to 7 win.

Rink 3, skipped by Mac could only score 1 shot on the first 6 ends but picked up a 7 on end 7 pulling the score back to 8 all. The scores stayed almost level until Ashcombe picked up a 1 on the last 4 ends with a 12 to 16 win for Ashcombe.

Rink 5, skipped by myself, had a perfect start, running up 16 to nil by the 5th end. Afterwards it was 1’s and 2’s between both teams, ending in a 23 to 9 win. However, Ashcombe had to lose 25% so only ended up with 6.25 shots.

Final points 10 to 2, with 58 to 29.75 points to Banwell.

Big thanks to Wendy for running the bar and supplying ice lollies at the 9th end interval.

Mal Laycock

Captain of the day

Turnbull Cup round 3, at home to Congresbury, 30/06/2026

A damp evening for the early ends saw us entertain Congresbury in the Turnbull Cup. They brought along their usual sprinkling of enthusiastic youngsters in the side.

After some enforced last minute changes to our side, we got under way. The weather cleared and all rinks were fairly even over the first few ends, but as the match went on there were a couple of noticeable gaps opening up on two of the rinks scores.

Dave Allen had a very tidy game leading, helping to give John Wright's rink a 15-12 win. Whilst leading for most of the game, Mal Laycock's four still managed a solid 16-16 draw.

The levels of our opponents were a little too much for our other two rinks though, seeing Both Allan Shattock's and Dave William's fours being beaten, giving Congresbury the win.

Final Score 45-68 to Congresbury

We go into the Wedmore Plate, to be played on Tuesday 21st July (opponents to be confirmed.)

John Wright

Captain of the day

Umbrella, 29/06/2026

It was a calm and drama-free start to this week's umbrella; no massive thunder and lightning, stinky car park puddles or excessive heat - just pleasant sunshine and members arriving in plenty of time to register and get a drink before the match began.

We played 3 rinks of triples this week. Well done to Janis and Sue S, who performed well in their first match as skip.

On rink 1, Dave A, Wayne and skip Trevor G came a cropper to team Debbie, gaining only 3 ends out of 15. Along with Martina and Will, the victorious three bulldozed their way to an emphatic win, starting with a score of 9 from the first two ends!

The final score was 26-4.

Dave W led Jan and Jenny on rink 4, with Jim and Mark H aiding skip Janis to a 17-9 win. it was nip and tuck for the first ten ends, but after a 5 on end eleven, Janis's team never looked back.

Meanwhile on rink 5, we saw the battle of the sisters, as Sue S and Wendy skipped their teams. Both teams were made up of relative newcomers, apart from Wendy. Mark W, Alex and Wendy won the first 4 ends, and, although it was very evenly balanced from that point onwards, Kerry, Jane and Sue were unable to catch up after Wendy's early lead.

Team Wendy won 9-6.

Well done all on a fab evening of sociable and competitive bowling. There is a clear lead of the umbrella competition at the moment, with 2 others being equal second. We have 3 more weeks before the low scores start dropping off the chart, affecting the table and maybe changing the leaders.

Click here to see the latest results on the website, or scroll along to the Umbrella tab on the Spaces app.

Kim Wright