Newsletters and Reports
Spring 2024 News from club secretary Peter Duffy
Hello All,
I hope that this finds you well and like myself you are all looking forward to the new bowls season.
I can confirm that your President for 2024, John Wright is looking forward to greeting you all and opening the green officially on Saturday 13th April’24, although the green will be available from Saturday 6th April’24 for those that want to practice, this is due to the early start of the leagues. Please note that there will be no “Morning” play available in April due to the expected heavy early morning dew.
Bowls England Vice President
I am very proud to advise you that Sheila Storey was elected recently as the Bowls England Vice President at their AGM, this is a huge honour for Sheila, our club and our county. This will no doubt be a lot of work for Sheila and will require a lot of her time, I hope that you will join me in wishing her a very successful year and also, if required, provide her with any support she may require, I’m already looking forward to next season when Sheila will be the BE President.
The Green
Once again, a lot of work has been going on throughout the autumn, winter and spring to ensure that our facilities and green are in good condition ready for another enjoyable season, on your behalf I would like to take this opportunity to thank them all for their hard work, their efforts are much appreciated. The green is looking good at this stage, let’s hope that we get a good spring this year to help the greens team make it even better.
Members
We will be welcoming a few new members at the start of the season and hopefully a few more as the season progresses as we will be taking part in the Bowls England Big Weekend this year and we will be holding an open day on Sunday 26th May’24 so if you know of anyone considering taking up the game then please invite them to come along. Let’s hope they all have a great first season with us, special thanks go to Kurt Obermaier who continues to do an excellent job with the clubs website which attracts a lot of attention and has encouraged several of the new members to come and join us!
Sadly, I have to report the passing of three of our past members; Mike Fisher, Bruce Smith and Werner Maier, all of them gentlemen who lived well into their 90’s, a good advert for our game, they all enjoyed many happy years at our club and will be missed.
Fixtures
There is another extremely busy season ahead for us with the county leagues and competitions in addition to our long-standing friendly fixtures, please get involved, you will see lists to nominate yourself on the notice board, just add your name, if you are not sure, ask one of the committee members, they will be happy to help. A full fixture list booklet will be available, please see Brian Duell for one!
President’s Day will be Saturday 3rd August this year.
Clubhouse
Once again, the team have been working hard throughout the close season updating our facilities to make things work just that little bit better for us, there have been updates to the kitchen, the women’s locker room, the men’s toilet, the lighting in the clubhouse and we have also purchased new tables so that the meals are a little bit more comfortable, special thanks must go to George Bennett, Dave Lane, Steve Pallas, Trevor Morrison and Norma Povey, your efforts are much appreciated. Also, a special thank you to the team that meet on Tuesday mornings to keep on top of all the maintenance tasks, your efforts are also much appreciated, they are always happy to receive new recruits to the team!
Sponsors
You will probably have noticed the sponsor boards around the green last year, I am happy to confirm that they will be sponsoring us once again this year, special thanks to: Jan Forster Estates, Charlotte's Butchery, Wideopen Tyres and Exhausts, Gosforth Empire Club, Hadrian Healthcare Group, Howett & Dickinson Podiatric and Abbeyfield Care Home, your support is much appreciated.
If you know of anyone or any other organisation that would like to sponsor us then please let me know.
Dress Code
As we have a few new members already this year I thought that I should provide the dress code for the varying types of play, see below:
Casual – Following the success of casual dress for casual play we will be continuing with this approach although, ripped jeans and football shirts are still not permitted.
Spoons – The Saturday Spoons is still the traditional gathering and greys with white above the waist is required, club shirts are also permitted, although blazers and ties are now optional.
Jumble – This is the same as Casual, see above.
Friendly Fixtures – Changed code: we will be playing these fixtures in our new club tops with greys this year.
BN Leagues – Men – Greys and club shirts
Parliamentary – Greys and the old-style club shirts
BN Leagues – Women – Greys and club shirts
NELBL – Women – Greys and club shirts
Club Competitions – Greys and white above the waist or club shirts
Club Equipment
Club Shirts and Jackets - New shirts and Jackets can be purchased from Steve Pallas or Brian Duell.
Club Keys – These can be purchased from Brian Duell at a cost of £20 (That’s what we are charged for them)
Club Stickers – These are also available from myself or Brian Duell
Club Competitions
The lists for the club competitions are now posted on the notice boards, they are free to enter so put your names down but please when they are drawn try and arrange them as soon as possible. Once again, we will be holding a “Finals Day” on Sunday 1st September, last year was a particularly bad year for members not playing prior to the “closing date”, therefore, anyone not playing prior to the
closing day and not advising the competition steward of any difficulties in doing so prior to the closing date will be scratched, there is a new steward for the competitions, Simon Richardson.
Events
We have been holding some events again this winter, all of which were very successful. Although the organising and running of these events is a good team effort, special thanks must go to the fab four, Mike & Norma Povey and George & Rosemary Bennett. These events are vital for the club, not only are they great for keeping in touch with good friends they also generated much needed funds for the club, your continued support is much appreciated, please note that these events are not for members only, you can bring along guests. We hope to hold future events so please keep an eye on the noticeboard in the clubhouse for a St George’s Day celebration, a BBQ and who know what else!
Plans are already in progress for the Christmas Party with the booking of Mea Deen confirmed.
Subscriptions
Finally, the subscriptions are now due, they have been increased this year by £5 to £130.00, thank-you to those of you who have already paid them, these can be paid to Norma on opening day or to any member of the Management Committee, I shall be available most evenings. Or you can simply do a BACS transfer to:
Gosforth Bowling Club
30-93-55
37036568
Please do this as soon as possible so that we can finish the task and get on with enjoying the season.
See you on the green,
Peter Duffy
Hon. Secretary
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Gosforth Bowling Club’s Secretary’s Report for 2023
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Hello All,
I hope that you are all well, that you enjoyed last season as much as myself and you are now taking good care of yourselves and looking forward to next season.
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I would like to take this opportunity to thank our President, Steve Pallas and his wife Jan for their efforts in guiding us through another successful year for Gosforth BC in 2023, their efforts should not be taken for granted and on behalf of all our members I would like to take this opportunity to say “thank-you”. They got the season got off to a great start hosting a bowls tour to the island of Jersey where we played five games against the local clubs, I’m not entirely sure of all of the results but I am sure that a good time was had by all, I believe I won top skip! 😊
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I would also like to say thank you and congratulations to both Norma Povey and Sheila Storey on their successful season too, Norma took on the role of Bowls Northumberland (BN) Ladies President this year and brought the BN women to Gosforth several times, I say with confidence that each occasion was a success due to Norma’s hosting skills and the efforts of our team of helpers who ensured the days were successful. In addition, Sheila was elected to the role of Bowls England (BE) Junior Vice President prior to being the BE President in 2025 a huge honour for her, her club and her county and a lot of work no doubt in the future, I would like to take this opportunity to wish Sheila well for the next few years, and I hope that you will all join me in supporting Sheila during this period.
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What else has been going on?
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Green and Maintenance
2023 brought our greens committee some challenging weather conditions to manage, there was a lack of a Spring, then a drought in June to what seemed like endless rain for the remainder of the season, I would like to congratulate the greens committee, on your behalf, as I think that you will agree that our green continued to play very well throughout the season despite the challenging weather. It was good to see Brian Duell’s new apprentice, Paul Trainer, join the team taking over the task of moving the rink markers, it’s always good to see new helpers join in, there is always room for more helpers though! I would also like to thank those members that have been helping out with our end of season green maintenance programme, a good squad turned up to help move ten tonne of sand in less than an hour, it was good to watch, I did make them all a bacon sandwich though!
George Bennett continues to be our head of maintenance and along with his helpers they continue to keep our clubhouse and grounds in excellent condition, if you are good at DIY and /or gardening and interested in getting involved please contact George or myself, you can never have too many helpers, they tend to meet regularly on Tuesday mornings at the club.
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Club Matches
Once again, we welcomed some new teams to Gosforth BC and along with some of our traditional long standing fixtures we had a very enjoyable and reasonably successful season, it’s always nice to receive compliments from the visiting teams regarding our green and facilities. Thanks must go to Brian Duell for his efforts in administrating these fixtures, it’s very much appreciated Brian. For those of you that have joined us in the past few years, these friendly fixtures are a great place to learn about the game of bowls, please don’t be shy, stick your name down on the availability notices posted on the notice boards throughout the season.
We have again been lucky enough to welcome quite a few new bowlers to our club, I hope that you are all continuing to enjoy the club and the game of bowls. Again, thanks, must also go to various members who have supported the new members, in particular Kurt Obermaier and George Bennett for providing the instruction and guidance that is required.
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There were mixed fortunes in the Leagues this year, in the Men’s leagues the Nines team managed to win the league, well done to those involved. The Knight Cup team, after a slow start, losing the first six games, rallied to finish fourth, while the Clegg Cup team also finished fourth. Our women’s team, in the Collins & Shipley league managed to finish 3rd, again, well done to all and thank you for supporting these events.
Our Men were successful in the Bowls Northumberland Edwardson Cup this year, this is a three rinks team event, it’s always a nice competition to win, I can confirm that Gosforth had a convincing 74 shots to 41 over Rothbury in the final, well done to all involved.
In the Parliamentary League the team managed to win the league and in the Rington’s Cup the triple of Mark Dickinson, Chris Brown and George Bennett also won the title, well done to all. In order to have a qualifier for the Parliamentary Champion of Champions competition next year a new club competition was created, congratulations go to Chris Brown who won this new competition and will now be our representative next year in the Parliamentary League Champion of Champions.
We hold two open competitions each year and last year they were both won by Gosforth BC members with the father & son duo of Jim and Richard Curtis winning the pairs and in the triples Chris Yeomans, Simon Richardson & Josh Minto were successful.
The men’s club competitions continued to be challenging, once again, very few members seem to be willing to arrange the games, however, we did get them all played.
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Congratulations go to Simon Richardson & Sheila Storey who won the Club Championship’s this year, well done to you both , the other successful players were.
Men’s Handicap Steve Miller
Men’s Two Bowl Steve Miller
Men’s Senior Singles John Wright
Men’s Pairs Steve Miller & Andy James
Ladies Two Bowl Mattea Ross
Ladies Pairs Sheila Storey & Mattea Ross
Mixed Pairs Paul Trainer & Norma Povey
Tuesday Jumbles Jim McLelland
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Once again, we were very successful in the Bowls Northumberland County Competitions, please see results below.
Bowls Northumberland Men’s Championship’s
Singles Simon Richardson - Champion
Pairs Chris Yeomans & Josh Minto – Champions
Bowls Northumberland Ladies Championship’s
Two-Bowl Singles Mattea Ross – Runner-Up
Pairs Sheila Storey & Mattea Ross – Runners-Up
Senior Fours Fiona Woods, Norma Povey, Erica Timoney and Sheila Storey - Champions
Northern County Championships
These were held in Lancashire this year where Josh Minto and Richard Curtis, deputising for Chris Yeomans, won the pairs title, well done to you both.
Bowls England Competitions
Mixed Fours – Congratulations to our members Chris Yeomans and Simon Richardson and the two Benfield women of Kayleigh Proctor and Rachael Cartwright who not only qualified but won the National title at Leamington Spa this year, a great achievement, they beat the former World No 1, Nicky Brett and his team in the final, coming back from 2 – 10 down, it was a privilege to watch them.
Men’s Senior Pairs – Congratulations to our President, Steve Pallas who along with Gary Myerscough from St George’s also reached the regional finals for the second year in succession and reached the last 8 in England.
Men’s Two Fours – Well done to our men’s team that managed to win through to the national quarter final at Leamington Spa losing narrowly on the last end to Worcester, a great effort.
Members
Sadly, one of our past members, Carl Eagle, passed away in July this year, Carl was a real character and is responsible for a lot of the photograph’s we have hanging on the wall in the clubhouse, Carl & his wife Ann moved to Spain about 20 years ago and recently returned due to Carl’s ill-health, our thoughts are with his wife Ann.
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Club Functions
We now have some established social events which have been excellent evenings enjoyed by all those in attendance, thanks in particular go to Norma Povey, Rosemary Bennett and their helpers in making these evenings such a success.
I can confirm that we have more planned for this winter so please try and support them, it’s just a fun way to keep in touch, they are;
Quiz and Fish & Chip supper on 25th November’23, 7.00pm for 7.30pm
Christmas Party is on Saturday 9th December’23, 7.00pm for 7.30pm
Burns Night will be on Saturday 3rd February’24, 7.00pm for 7.30pm
dates for the St George’s Day celebration and the summer BBQ are yet to be agreed.
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Peter Duffy
Hon. Secretary
Gosforth Bowling Club
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