Yarraville-Footscray did the Bowls Victoria metro premier division “their way” and can be proud of their efforts despite it ending in relegation.
The Bulldogs bucked the trend of high-priced, fly-by-nighter recruits and rewarded the home-grown talent that took them into Victoria’s top division. The Dogs managed only three wins in the campaign, but were competitive in all but a handful of games en route to second-last place.
“It took two years’ work to get the top side into premier league so we let our own people who did the work have the benefit of it,” coach Wayne Roberts told the Weekly.
“They’re going to learn a lot from that experience of having 12 months in the premier league and they’ll go back to divvy one better players for that next year. We’ll be a reasonable side in divvy one.”
The Bulldogs continued to improve into the season. All three of their wins came in the final six rounds of the season, the most memorable over powerhouse Moonee Ponds.
“We dominated, led from the first end all the way through,” Roberts said.
“They’re a team that’s in the finals and probably good enough to win the flag.”
The Bulldogs rounded out the season with a 90-70 win against Burwood District.
They were undermanned without regular Roberts and Alan Dove but found the necessary reinforcements to claim the victory that would see them avoid the dreaded wooden spoon. Mal Reilly (27-13) filled in as skip with aplomb to finish up 14. Ray Caulter (26-19) was the other winning skip, by seven. Jamie Pearce (19-18) went down by a shot, while Nat Black (19-all) had a tie.
Meanwhile, Altona got the four rinks to have the zip win over Mentone that it desired – but still missed out on the finals.
The A’s’ 101-62 victory came courtesy of Brett Foley (26-13), David Zitter (26-15), Brad Peck (26-22) and Matthew Rennex (23-12).
