Lee Schraner set to star for Dover
A report for The Mercury by Peter Kirby
In an innovative move this Saturday, Dover will be fielding Lee Schraner, from the Raymond Terrace Bowls Club in NSW, and one of Australia’s most accomplished bowlers, for a one-off guest appearance for the club when they welcome Howrah to Dover for their Round 5 match in Bowls South’s Divergence Built Premier Division.
Dover’s players will be inspired by Schraner’s presence while Howrah will do well not dwell too heavily on a single player but to focus on the match overall in the hope that their efforts across all four rinks will be sufficient to nullify the Schraner-effect.
It is definitely an exciting promotion for bowls in southern Tasmania, which may inspire other Premier Division clubs to follow Dover’s lead and take similar actions to invite elite bowlers for guest appearances to highlight the sport of bowls.
Schraner will be the guest speaker at a function in the Dover RSL Club after the match, commencing at 6:30pm, providing insights into the personal qualities that have enabled him to reach the pinnacle of his chosen sport as a 9-time National Champion, representing Australia on 52 occasions, 23 State Championships across three states (Victoria, Tasmania and NSW), and over 330 State matches.
Semi Finals and Finals of Bowls South’s Open and B Grade Singles Championships will be conducted on Kingborough’s greens on Sunday, 19 November. In the Semi Final round, commencing at 10am, Meekie Salter (Claremont) will play Joy Voss Glenorchy Rodman), and Tayla Munro (Brighton) plays Trudy Davis (Claremont) in the Open Women’s event, while in B Grade, Jo-Anne Leslie (Brighton) plays Dianne Coleman (Taroona), and Halina Travers (Howrah) plays Ros Bridge (Taroona).
In the Men’s Open Singles, Michael Taylor (Claremont) will play Gavin Cleary (Kingborough), and Jack Ellis (Glenorchy Rodman) takes on New Norfolk’s Rodney Carmicheal. In the Men’s B Grade event, Robert Johnston (Howrah) plays Robert Lockley (Claremont), and Brighton’s David Williams will play Danny Lockley (New Norfolk).
It is a rare event in a pennant bowls match that a team is able to place all 8 of its bowls closer to the jack than its opposition, and many bowlers go their whole career having never achieved the feat, so it is quite amazing that at Orford last Thursday, in a Women’s Division 2 match, Orford’s Carol Bannister and her team of Sally Giblin and Kathy Freeman and Dinah Bennett claimed a magic 8 not once but twice during their game against their New Norfolk opponents.