After winning their Section, the Central Coast Seniors Side lost by one shot in the quarter final of the 2019 Senior Inter-Zone Sides Championship. For the first time ever, a quarter-final was played of the sides that came first or second in sectional play . It proved to be the undoing of Zone 15 as they lost their quarter final to Manning (Zone 11) by one shot. The heroes of this game were John Robert's team of himself as skip, Greg Pigram, lead, Alan Lewin 2nd, Col Passfield 3rd. They had a 33 to 10 win over the Manning side skipped by bowls legend Rex Johnson. As well as producing this mighty win, John Robert's team nearly won the match as they were holding the required shots on the last end until Rex with his last bowl moved the jack to only loose the end by 2 shots not the 3 we needed.
As defending champions Zone 15 had a shock 2 point loss in the first game against Greater Western Sydney (Zone 5). John Robert's team were the only winning rink. In the 2nd game order was restored with a 3 rink win over South Eastern NSW (Zone 7). The best rink win was by the four of Lee Thompson, Phil Westcott, Lindsay Willding & Tony Shoebridge.
This meant that Central Coast had to defeat Sydney South West/Zone 12 (the side they played in last year's final) to be sure of getting into the quarter final). They had a resounding 30 point win over Sydney South West 72 to 42 with the side of Gary Frost, Peter Hamill, Bill Constantine & Dick Thornton recording a 15 point rink win. South Eastern NSW had a surprise win over Greater Western Sydney giving Central Coast the Section win.
While it is true that the Central Coast Side including Reserve Tony Swain, Side Manager Garry Ellis and Chairman of Selectors David Cameron had hoped to do better, by winning a Section they still established Central Coast Zone 15 as one of the strongest Senior sides in NSW.
If you would like to see more details of the results click here
