Victoria players continued their domination of the Wellington branch of the NZ Professional Bowls Association over the last two qualifying weekends at the Naenae club. Last month Ray Martin added to his NZ playoffs berth for the Scottish Singles by winning the Wellington qualifier for the World Indoor Singles beating Laurie Guy in the final 9-8, 10-6. Ray survived through several close encounters throughout the day including over Roy Gibb in the semifinal. Laurie beat Richard Corry in his semifinal and has also had a good PBA season going down in another final that weekend to Bradley Down in the ranking singles event 9-0, 5-5. Roy had a good weekend falling to Laurie in the ranking singles semifinal. Laurie will get to play in the NZ finals weekend in Hastings next month in the World Indoor Pairs playoffs partnering Richard.
This month’s qualifying weekend saw Richard win the ranking singles event beating Nicole Toomey 9-7, 7-8, 2-0 in the final after Nicole had beaten Laurie in the semifinals. This meant Victoria had all the finalists in the first 5 PBA events in Wellington before the sequence was broken on the last day of the Wellington season. Jeremy Kydd was the last Victoria player standing in the International Singles qualifier going down in the semifinal.
The great consistency of the Victoria players are reflected in the national rankings with Laurie currently 6th, Bradley 7th=, Richard 9th and Ray 15th in the NZ PBA.