Stanhope star Ben Fletcher trailed Tongala's Brad Tinning by 11 shots before an amazing comeback saw his rink win by one.
A pair of come from behind rink wins have extended the fairytale that is Stanhope Bowling Club’s 2024-25 Campaspe Playing Area division one pennant season into a grand final.
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The Stanhope team finished bottom of the ladder in its return campaign to the Campaspe association, but this year finished on top at the end of the home and away season. On Saturday the side went straight into the grand final with a three-shot win against Tongala, winning all three rinks by one shot for a 53-50 overall victory.
Tim Hancock and the competition’s number one bowler for this season, Ben Fletcher, produced extraordinary comebacks to guide their rinks to one-shot wins and Greg Fitzpatrick completed the whitewash when he hung on narrowly for a one-shot win of his own.
Hancock trailed Tongala’s Stephen Hammond by eight after the Bulls star picked up five shots on the 11th end. Four successive end wins followed for Hancock to square the ledger and another three Hancock end wins gave him a four-shot lead with two ends remaining.
Jorge and Austin Maxwell have been part of Ben Fletcher's all conquering rink that won again in Saturday's semi-final.
Hammond won both those, but lost overall 19-20.
Brad Tinning won nine of the opening 11 ends to lead Fletcher by 11 shots after 11 ends. The match was turned on its head from that point, Fletcher taking the lead for the first time in the match on end 19 as he won all but two of the final 10 ends for a 17-16 win.
Fitzpatrick’s win against Glenn Fields was another see-sawing bout, Fitzpatrick winning four of the opening five ends before dropping eight shots on the next four ends to trail by five.
He regained the lead on the 15th end, gave it up on the very next end and then trailed by three with two ends remaining. Fitzpatrick won both of those to win 16-15.
Tongala will now play Moama in the preliminary final for the right to challenge Stanhope for the 2024-25 title after the Steamers dominated Echuca 71-34.
Barry and Steve Tinning are deep in conversation at a windy Rochester Bowling Club during the team's narrow defeat on Saturday.
- In a double blow for the Bulls the club’s division two team was knocked out of the premiership race in another three-shot result.
They lost 52-55 to Deniliquin, who they had beaten only a week earlier by 13 shots, despite winning two of the three rinks.
Phil Cooper stepped up to the role of skip, with Wayne Cowley promoted to division one, and won his rink by eight shots with Geoff Tinning, Geoff Vistirini and Kelvin Walsh in support.
Jorja Ponton won her rink by a shot, but the 12-shot loss of Danny O’Brien was enough to cancel out the two Bulls rink wins and put their season in cotton balls.
- A 17-shot win by Graeme Nurse was the catalyst of Stanhope division four’s elimination semi-final win against Lockington on Saturday at Elmore.
Nurse and Tony Trist both had rink wins, while the draw of Peter Harris gave the team an overall win of 19 shots (68-49). They will now face Echuca in the preliminary final, with the chance of joining the club’s division one team in the grand final in two weeks time.
The 24-7 Nurse win came after he built a 16-nil lead after nine ends. That margin extended to 19 four ends later before a Lockington response saw them win five of the final eight ends.
Trist’s high scoring game saw him collect six shots on the fourth end of the game and after 10 ends he led by eight. Ends 11 and 12 saw his opponent collect an extraordinary 10 shots, but it took Trist only four ends to square the match again.
There was one twist left in the game, despite Trist leading by eight shots with one end remaining. He dropped six shots on the final two ends to scrape home 27-25.
Harris dropped two shots on the first end of his game, but collected three on the very next end and did not surrender the lead again for the remainder of the game. That was until the final end when the teams finished on 17-apiece.
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