Kathy Gobbart Drives to title win
On a beautiful and warm Friday at Morley Bowling Club the quarter-finals and finals of the GenesisCare Women’s Over 60’s ensued. Gingin’s Kathy Gobbart Claimed the singles win after a brilliant finals against recent state singles winner Irene Arndt (Safety Bay). The temperature was perfect and the wind was clear making an ideal environment to have the finals take place. The Morley Bowling Club did well hosting the event and bowlers had no complaints playing on the relatively new synthetic green the club had to offer.
After impressive clashes of bowls in the quarter-finals at Osborne Park on Thursday 23rd February only four Bowlers remained heading to Morley for the Semi-finals. The Quarter Finals had some contrasting results with three out of four games finishing with 8+ shots distance; Kathy Gobbart defeated Kerry Rush (Manning) 21 shots to 9, Helen Heal (Manning) defeated Gail Ecclestone (Bunbury) 21 shots to 17, Irene Arndt defeated Rhonda Prosser (North Beach) 21 shots to 12 and Lisa Featherby (Mosman Park) defeated Therese Hastings(Manning) 21 shots to 10.
Moving into the Semi-Finals Gobbart continued her momentum from the Quarter-Final despite Heal’s best effort. Heal’s two ends of 4 fell short to Gobbart’s consistency with her coming out on top. Gobbart won five ends in a row from the seventh end to the twelfth and the distance continued to grow from 13-8 to 21-12 in favor of Gobbart by the 19th end.
Irene Arndt versus Lisa Featherby was a closer game than their counterparts. Featherby started off strong with Bowls that just hit their mark winning the first three ends with five shots in total. A comfortable start for Featherby as the score sat at 4-8 on end seven, the pressure was on for Arndt to pick up some ends or be left far away from the jack. Rising to the challenge Arndt closed the distance winning five ends in a row and taking the lead to 13-8 on end eleven. Arndt continued drawing just right claiming multiple ends from then on and a big four shots on end 13. Featherby fought back with her own four straight after bringing the score to 19-13. A tough back and forth with both Ladies picking up ones and twos meant Arndt kept the lead ending the game with one shot on the 19th end.
The Semi-Final winners Irene Arndt and Kathy Gobbart were set to face off against one another for the Title around midafternoon. Two well known and accomplished bowlers made the finals more interesting with either favoured to win. Kathy Gobbart recently entered the Bowls WA Hall of fame, Country Week singles champion, Country Bowler of the Year and Champion of Club Champions Singles winner all in 2022. Irene Arndt also favoured for the title after winning multiple Over 60’s Singles in 2017 and 2018 whilst most notably claiming the State singles winner of 2023.
Gobbart started the finals winning the first two ends of the game bringing early pressure to Arndt at 4-0. The ends stayed relatively mirrored with neither side letting up, shots were won back and forth bringing the score to 8-6 in favor of Gobbart by the seventh end. Gobbart managed to create further distance with some carefully weighted bowls that drew comfortably to the jack claiming a total of 3 shots over the next two ends. whilst the shots held kept changing as the bowls stayed competitive, the next four ends went to Irene by end 13 the game was matched 11 to 11. From the 14th end to the 22nd end the match found itself going back and forth between the two players as they demonstrated heir consistency and competitiveness, living up to their achievements.
It was on the 23rd and final end that shocked the spectators and players alike. With a score of 17-18 Arndt held two shots after her last bowl of the end. At first it looked like the end would go to Arndt as Gobbart’s second to last bowl just had too much weight. Gobbart changed strategy an attempt to drive in hopes for a different outcome. Over the event this would be one of few drives to take place but none as successful as this. The drive was straight and on course for the jack, a perfect weight dispersed the jack away from the 2 held shots and spun towards Gobbarts bowls. It was clear that three shots was gained but only after a measure was it decided that a winning fourth was held. An impressive drive led from three shots down to four up winning the game for Gobbart.
At the end of the day it was great to see great bowls played and the level of support and respect shown to the competitors and to each other make the event that much better.
