Terry Hall

Interclub Competition Round 2 NOVAR Gdns – 22 September 2019

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The renaissance of SA pétanque continued in Round 2 with a population explosion. Undeterred by the threat of showers (which fortunately stayed away for the most part), a staggering turn-out of 87 players took to the pistes at Novar Gardens. That’s 15 more than in Round 1, which in turn had the most we’d seen for over a decade.

Five different clubs were represented in the top five positions, but the winning team was the highly-credentialled and experienced trio of Selina Dally, Wendy Bensen & Maurice Belz, from ESP. No surprises there. However, also on the podium were some of the newer entrants to the field and potential stars of the future. In second place, and all taking home their first League medal, were Mike Read, Ashton Claridge & Mal Bedsonfrom the Adelaide Hills club. Bronze went to the Novar Gardens team of Jonathan Giddings, Bruce Lucas & Jean-Luc Gonnet, with Bruce also registering a personal best. Congratulations and well done to all.
Selina, Maurice, WendyMike, Ashton, MalBruce, Jonathan,
Jean-Luc

This was one of those rounds where the pattern of results did not fit what we would normally expect. In particular, we had a very unusual situation in Pool A where five of the fourteen teams won all three of their preliminary games, with only one of the others winning more than one. This created a few apparent anomalies in the final rankings, such as one team that won all five of their games but couldn’t climb up to a medal-winning position because their morning points tally was ‘only’ +19.

In terms of the championship, the lesson was that there’s safety in numbers. Despite the fact that each club can only claim the points from their two best-placed teams, it was the three clubs with five or more teams that picked up the biggest hauls ‒ Eastern Suburbs cemented their place at the top of the table, while Adelaide Hills and Novar Gardens were the big movers. The latter two have climbed up into third and fourth place, respectively, at the expense of FAB and Gawler, while Adelaide (2nd), Prospect (6th) and Port Noarlunga (8th) all maintained their first-round positions.

Thanks to the well-organised Novar Gardens crew for hosting the day.Continue reading→

Australian Masters Games – October 5-12

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Well the games are almost here, the first competition, the Singles is at ESP on Saturday October 5. And that night at the Convention Centre the first night of Entertainment, Adelaide cover band Blackjack is on following the Opening Ceremony.

The Doubles competitions follows at Novar Gardens with the Doubles competition on the Monday 7th and Mixed Doubles are on Tuesday 8th in the afternoon followed by the Pétanque Social Function that evening.

Wednesday night has more entertainment, Immaculate Madonna

The Triples competitions is on at Prospect on the Thursday.

Friday Night there is more Entertainment, – The Ultimate Elvis Tribute with Mark Anthony

Saturday is the Closing Ceremony and more entertainment – Billy Joel Tribute Concert

For more details on the schedule of games go to the AMG Page. The schedule is downloadable here

2019/20 SA State Doubles Championship

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at:  Prospect Pétanque Club                  25 August, 2019

This year’s State Doubles Championship was held at Prospect in fine and mild conditions. Twenty-five pairs took part, including male, female and mixed-gender teams, which was the best attendance at this event for at least ten years.

The competition was more even than some might have predicted, with lots of close games and plenty of upsets. By the end of the four preliminary games, only one team remained undefeated and that was a portent of what was to follow.

The stand-out team on the day was the pairing of a young gun and emerging star with an established grand master of the game — Nick Armstrong & Maurice Belz swept all before them and are the new state champions. Well done, messieurs! This is the second SA state title for each of these players. Nick’s winner’s trophy will sit next to one from the 2107/18 Mixed Doubles, while Maurice is now the reigning champion in both Doubles and Singles.

Maurice Belz & Nick Armstrong

Congratulations must also go to Sue & Peter Matthews, who performed strongly all day and finished as runners-up and ‘the best of the rest’. Sue & Peter were part of a large contingent of teams from the fledgling Novar Gardens club that, on the whole, accounted for themselves very well.

Continue reading→

Changes in SAPL Calendar

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Due to an unforeseen clash with a large public event at Gawler on the 22nd of September, the venues for Rounds 2 and 3 of the Interclub competition have been swapped around…

Round 2 will be held at NOVAR GARDENS on Sept 22; 

Round 3 will be held at GAWLER on Nov 24.

Also, note

The Trebes Cup at FAB has been moved from Sept 8 to Sunday, Sept 29, to avoid a clash with the Interstate Challenge.

Petanque Calendar  Version b