Champ not relying on home advantage

Shannon McIlroy isn't taking his home-green advantage for granted as he prepares to defend his Stoke invitation singles bowls title this weekend.

The 22-year-old Nelson bowler beat his Stoke clubmate Gary Watson 21-11 in last year's final and is anticipating another tough assignment over the next three days against a quality field.

"There's a stronger field this year, compared to last year," said McIlroy, after failing to defend his title at Dunedin's North East Valley Invitation singles tournament at Labour weekend.

Despite beating eventual winner Shaun Scott 25-18 in his first game, McIlroy had to settle for victory in the plate final. But he isn't letting that failed defence affect his preparations for this weekend.

"I won my first game [in Dunedin] against the guy who eventually won it, but the next couple after that I hit a bit of a speed bump and lost a few in a row. But I only missed out [qualifying] in the end by one point.

"I actually trialled some new bowls down there and it probably wasn't the wisest thing to do. But towards the end of the tournament, things started to come right and my last five games I ended up winning quite convincingly."

He knows he'll have to produce some top form over the next three days and hopes that the strong winds that affected last weekend's interclub competition will stay away.

"Even in the section that I'm in, it's going to be quite hard, and any of the eight players could really go through to the top eight.

"The green's playing well but it will all depend on the wind. Last weekend it was quite windy ... and it made it quite a lot trickier. So it's a good leveller if it is a bit windy."

McIlroy is one of three former Stoke champions in the field. Canterbury's Kelvin Scott, now playing out of Marlborough, won the 1998 and 2000 titles, while South Canterbury's Sean O'Neill was successful in 2004.

Like his former Canterbury team-mate Scott, Shayne Sincock is now also playing out of Marlborough and was a member of the New Zealand team that contested the Asia-Pacific championships in Kuala Lumpur in August.

McIlroy will be entering the tournament in a positive frame of mind after being confirmed, earlier this week, as a finalist in the New Zealand Maori sports awards alongside Kiwis rugby league captain Benji Marshall and All Black Isaac Ross. The awards ceremony is on December 5 – a week before McIlroy attends a hearing after he and his New Zealand fours team-mates, Gary Lawson, Jamie Hill and Sincock, were stood down by New Zealand Bowls pending a judicial inquiry into charges arising from their performance in a section game against Thailand at the Asia-Pacific tournament.

Round-robin play starts tomorrow at 9am, with the final scheduled for early Sunday afternoon.

Section one: Shayne Sincock (Marlborough), Jimmy Pugh (Stoke), Trevor Pascoe (West Coast), Allan Griffiths (Stoke), Larry Sutherland (Stoke), Sean O'Neill (South Canterbury), Russell Calder (Stoke), Lloyd Gallop (Marlborough).

Section two: Kelvin Scott (Marlborough), Shannon McIlroy (Stoke), Lance Pascoe (West Coast), David Eades (Stoke), Peter Hodson (Stoke), Barry Andrews (South Canterbury), Paul Baken (Stoke), Andre Smith (Marlborough).

- © Fairfax NZ News

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