Short mat Bowls - Review of the Year

In its second full year since its foundation, the club has gone from strength to strength in membership, competition results and as a financially viability. This time last year we had 24 members but since then, perhaps attracted by the possibility of all year bowling or perhaps by the social nature of a compact indoor location, the membership increased at one time to 34.

There has always been a high percentage of attendance on our bowling days and consequently we have had to impose a membership limit of 30 because we have no room for
more than 3 mats.

Regrettably January 2009 saw the death of founder member Jack Burnett and in July member Les Wannell passed away.

In August almost the whole club attended a social evening to say farewell to founder member Ted Fisher who moved to France at the end of the month. Ted said that he was sure he would miss Hemyock and all the good friends he had made here. He also said that there appeared to be only one bowls club in France, far away from his new home. So it seems that he will have to learn to play boules. "That's not a proper game, just chucking a load of steel balls around!" said Ted. With Ted leaving the club membership is down to 31 and we already have 2 people on the waiting list. I suspect they may have quite a wait.

You may remember that last year the club was comprehensively beaten in all the inter-club friendly matches that we played and I was measuring our improvement by the reducing margin by which we were thrashed each time. Well, during this year the performance of most members has improved substantially to the point where, at home, we beat Rockwell Green club convincingly and even took a 6 point win over a strong team from Willand club.

Unfortunately we lost our return matches at Willand and Rockwell Green. However, we now feel strong enough to enter two teams in the Willand Autumn Fours Tournament at the end of October. Wish us luck. In our internal competitions, there has been a delay in completing the Drawn Pairs Competition for the Milford and Dormor Trophy and the winner of the Umbrella Competition (run over May, June and July) will be announced at the club's annual dinner.

During the year a number of fund raising events, including the enjoyable "SOUNDS OF THE SHADDOWS" concert in the village hall and our stall at the very successful Hemyock Fete were organised by our indefatigable Treasurer with the result that we were able to repay the balance of our start up loan from the hall committee about three years before it was due to be repaid. We are now in the black!

So apart from the sad departure of three of our members, it has been a good year for the club. Let's hope that we can make next year even better. For further
details about the club, ring the Secretary, Terry Wetherfield, on 01884 840677.