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In golf, people traditionally describe Round 3/Saturday at any tournament to be ‘Moving Day’, which is a term that also applies to Week 5 at Manning Jack Attack, because it’s the last chance for hopeful teams to get themselves in the Money Games (1st through to 6th) taking place in Week 6, when the Greatest Social Bowls Competition between Manning Road and the Canning River reaches its climax.

A feature of the penultimate night of the season was that prior to the banality of Wednesday night Jack Attack, Manning was providing the pre-game entertainment by playing host to some touring bowlers from Singapore (Tanglin Club, Lion City Club and Lawn Bowls Association for the Disabled), and among the Manning players taking on the tourists in some exhibition bowls were our own Richard ‘Half’ Price, and Buffed Helmets + Salty Towers team manager Glen ‘Scratch’ O’Brien:

A funny story from Pricey’s rink was that Ric Moroney (Who plays for Manning) was leading for Singapore, but Pricey jokingly said that he should’ve been the one leading for Singapore, given he was born there in 1960, before he found his way to Malaysia (Where his dad worked as a groundskeeper) and eventually boarded at Guildford Grammar.

After a post-game dinner provided by the Krankin Cafe crew, the Singaporeans got to witness Week 5 of Manning Jack Attack in action, and all in all, I’d say they were bedazzled by the spectacle of everyday people attempting to simultaneously drink and bowl, which probably isn’t a thing up in the Lion City.

On one final note, Wednesday night marked the last full moon of 2022, and they say spooky things can happen on a full moon…

Lightning going off in the west is one of those spooky things:

The Overall Night

Starting off the top, and unlike my cock-up last season where I announced the wrong team in the Grand Final, it should be fairly easy announcing the Spring 2022 Grand Final matchup, considering the two teams finished 1st and 2nd overall on Wednesday…

In 1st place (On two fronts) thanks to their straight sets +15 shot win against Ten Pin on Synthetic Rink 2, Macatac 1!

In a blind draw between the Top 8, Macatac 1 pulled out Ten Pin, and despite the fear of becoming the fifth team from as many games to be dragged into a tiebreak against Peter, Deb and Coral, it would turn out to be a resounding win to Duncan, Ellen and Heath (11-4 9-1), propelling them from 3rd up to 1st after the Bowled Guys and Crawshaw CC both faltered, which means Macatac have now appeared in consecutive Spring Jack Attack Grand Finals.

And their opponents, finishing 2nd overall on the night thanks to belting the Shapes in straight sets by +12 shots on Grass Rink 1…

The Jack Hunters!

The pre-season name change from Beginner’s Luck to the Jack Hunters has proven extremely effective in getting the best out of Fleur, Steve, Helen and the team, as they’ve rattled off 4 straight sets wins from 5 games, the latest being the munching of Shapes to jump into 2nd overall, earning them a maiden Jack Attack Grand Final appearance, which is what we like to see from a competitive standpoint.

If you remember back to Week 2, the Jack Hunters lost in straight sets against Fawesome, and traditionally losing a game in straight sets is a kiss of death for teams attempting to crack the Top 2, but the Jack Hunters have defied history… in fact, they could very well be the first team to ever make a Grand Final after losing a game in straights.

Heading the 3rd vs 4th playoff, after delivering a straight set mauling to a Wilko-less Crawshaw Crisis Committee…

Jack To The Drawing Board!

Since they copped a hiding from the Bowled Guys in Week 1 and exiled themselves down to Busselton, Jack To The Drawing Board have taken 15 out of a possible 16 points (4 of them coming thanks to Ronni and the Ring-Ins), getting them up to the bronze medal position (The best they’ve ever achieved under any of their guises), a mighty turnaround after Alex had them ready to gun for the wooden spoon following a dour showing in the Spring Challenge.

Their opponents in 4th overall will be Macatac 2, who overcame the Bowled Guys in straight sets on Synthetic Rink 5, and the decisive moment in the game came on the last end of the 1st Set, as the Bowled Guys had the lead 4-3 ahead of a double powerplay final end, but Macatac 2 (Without Di Mac) picked up 3 to turn it into 6 shots, and they would start the next end with a hold of 2, getting 2nd shot by a nose hair, and the Maccers never surrendered the lead after that.

The 5th vs 6th game will feature Paul’s Heroes, who rocketed from 11th up to 5th in the biggest move up the ladder by a team this week, thanks to defeating Fawesome in straight sets by +11 shots on Grass Rink 4 (9-1 11-8), and the aforementioned Bowled Guys, who managed to cling on to the lucky last Top 6 spot by all of 1 shot from Crawshaw, who gave up 2 on the last end of the game against JTTDB, which cost them dearly.

The other important game next week will be the Wooden Spoon game, and perhaps unsurprisingly it will feature the two teams who have been at the bottom for so long they’ve attached themselves to the wooden spoon like a barnacle to a pier…

This Is How We Roll against Stop Drop & Bowl!

The loser gets their name carved onto the wooden spoon as the crappiest team of the season, and the winner gets a toilet roll, because you’re the closest thing to crap.

As for the money for Week 5, as mentioned above Macatac 1 won the night won with +15 shots, the Jack Hunters finished 2nd with +12, while 3rd place on the night went to a countback, as Paul’s Heroes, Jack To The Drawing Board and The Lenny’s all won in straight sets with +11 shots, they all won 8 ends out of 10, sending us to the shots held countback, which comfortably went the way of Paul’s Heroes, who held a total of 20 shots against Fawesome.

Strangely enough, out of the 2 ends Paul’s Heroes dropped on the night, one of them was a 4 (8 shots) on a 2nd Set powerplay.

So that led us to the countback for 4th place, and for the first time ever, yours truly managed to run out of countback tiebreakers, as both JTTDB and The Lenny’s finished on 8 ends held, 14 shots scored and 3 shots conceded….

Rather than try to conjure up an ultimate tiebreaker, in the spirit of fairness, and thanks to the fact that our prize pool isn’t short of a dollar, JTTDB (Who got the envelope) and the Lenny’s will both get a prize, be it a $20 drinks voucher or cash, although Alex did give away his voucher to Jared, Kelsey and Naomi, as he just wanted to experience the thrill of collecting the envelope.

Now, completing the remainder of the results from Week 5:

On Grass Rink 3, Manning Up and the Great Bowls of Fire (With Ronni playing as a sub for Jonesy, who is currently hunting crayfish) took part in a Summer 2022 Grand Final rematch, although both teams have done a bit of freefalling in the 9 months since then, and the pendulum was swinging violently as the Great Bowls pitched a 8-0 shutout in the 1st Set, only for Manning Up to respond in the 2nd Set by rattling off a 4 in the powerplay, followed by a 2 and a 3 to win the set 15-1, setting up their narrow tiebreak win, getting a small measure of revenge for losing the Grand Final in a tiebreak.

On Synthetic Rink 1, the Top Shots managed to make it 5 tiebreaks from 5 games as they took on This Is How We Roll, winning the 1st Set 10-3 before losing the 2nd Set 2-10, but managing to reverse the trend of a season in which they’ve lost 3 out of 4 previous tiebreaks, Jerry, Leslie Gordon and Irene proved too good and wound up holding an easy 4 to get the win, which has allowed them to sneak into 10th spot on the ladder.

On Synthetic Rink 3, Rock N Bowl and Stop Drop & Bowl were going at each other’s throats throughout the 1st Set, as they picked up 3 out of the first 6 toucher vouchers that were on offer, in what can only be described as an impressive display of jack hunting:

The 1st Set would finish in a 4-4 draw, setting up a massive 2nd Set that would have repercussions for the Wooden Spoon game, with the winner pretty much guaranteed to avoid finishing in the Bottom 2, but it would be Rock N Bowl who got the win 6-3, thanks to winning the opening 3 ends (1, 2 and 3), setting up the Wooden Spoon derby between Stop Drop & Bowl and How We Roll.

On Synthetic Rink 4 (aka TV Rinkside), the Buffed Helmets 2 and the CD’s (Who were dead level on the ladder) had one of the games of the night, as Buffs 2 snuck in to win the 1st Set 5-4 thanks to holding 2 on the last end, before the CDs went to town on the indoor cricketers and smashed them 12-3 in the 2nd Set, with a particular highlight being the last end of the set, when the CDs were holding 4, only for Anthony/Fuzzy to try and smack them out on a drive, and somehow he cut it down to 2, and all told his purple bowl missed shot by half a foot:

Still, the crew of Carry, Cheese and Fuzzy steadied and got the job done with 2 in the tiebreak, the second week in a row they’ve got the points in a tiebreak, leaving them in 8th place on the ladder, although the boys won’t mind if they get a bottle of Pepperjack as a consolation for missing the Top 6.

Moving on to the game involving the sister Buffed Helmets 1 and Salty Towers on Synthetic Rink 6, yet another derby involving Glen O’Brien, and it was a similar result to the Buffs 2 game, albeit with a different method, as Salty Towers won the 1st Set 8-5 after leading 8-0 through 3 ends, in which Mazey bowled on the wrong bias in front of the entire team, however the Buffs 2 hit their stride and won the 2nd Set by a blowout 14-1 margin, forcing a tiebreak.

That tiebreak was apparently so close that a measure was required with a good 8 players around the head trying to measure the shot with everything short of a tape, so they had to force Scratch to go down and have a look as another lightning strike occurred in the distance, but by the time Scratch got to the head, both teams had moved everything, including the shot bowls and Mazey was seemingly the one to hold the winning shot for the Buffs.

According to Steph O’Brien, the Buffs didn’t win by a bee’s diaphragm, they won by LESS THAN a bee’s diaphragm.

And the lucky last result of the night was the game between the Salter Point Spinners and the Unbelievabowls on Synthetic Rink 8, aka the carpark, and it was the Spinners (Sue, Helen and Denise) who struck first and won the 1st Set 4-3, and led 3-0 in the 2nd Set, but the Unbelievabowls (Amanda, Sue, Lee and company) hit back and scored a 3 (6) on their powerplay to win the 2nd Set 9-5, and the only winless team this season would be winless no longer after the tiebreak was done, as the Unbelievabowls sat 2 within 2 feet of the jack to secure the win, with the set win for both teams ensuring they were well clear of the Bottom 2.

Results

Grass 1: Jack Hunters (4pts +12) defeated Shapes, 11-1 4-2

Grass 2: Jack To The Drawing Board (4pts +11) defeated Crawshaw CC, 10-0 4-3

Grass 3: Manning Up (3pts +6) defeated Great Bowls of Fire (2pts -6), 0-8 15-1 1-0 in the tiebreak

Grass 4: Paul’s Heroes (4pts +11) defeated Fawesome, 9-1 11-8

Synthetic 1: Top Shots (3pts -1) defeated This Is How We Roll (2pts +1), 10-3 2-10 4-0 in the tiebreak

Synthetic 2: Macatac 1 (4pts +15) defeated Ten Pin, 11-4 9-1

Synthetic 3: Rock N Bowl (3pts +3) defeated Stop Drop & Bowl (1pt -3), 4-4 6-3

Synthetic 4: Buffed Helmets 2 (3pts -8) defeated CD’s (2pts +8), 5-3, 3-12, 2-0 in the tiebreak

Synthetic 5: Macatac 2 (4pts +7) defeated Bowled Guys, 9-4, 4-2

Synthetic 6: Buffed Helmets 1 (3pts +10) defeated Salty Towers (2pts -10), 5-8 14-1 1-0 in the tiebreak

Synthetic 7: The Lenny’s (4pts +11) defeated Bowling Stones, 5-3 9-0

Synthetic 8: Unbelievabowls (3pts +3) defeated SPCG Spinners (2pts -3), 3-4 9-5 2-0 in the tiebreak

Showing you why we call it Moving Day, the Week 4 ladder looked like this:

And the Week 5 ladder looks like this:

Paul’s Heroes up from 11th to 5th

Crawshaw down from 1st to 7th

Shapes went from 7th to 15th

Ten Pin from 8th down to 17th

That’s how cut-throat we are on a Wednesday night.

Captain’s Comments

Alex, JTTDB: “Credit to the boys, good team performance, everyone scored very evenly for the match, and thank you once again to Ronni for getting our team into form in Week 2, we should take a week off more often!”

John, Manning Up: “We did the numbers and we let the form guys bowl in the last set, sat Todd on his arse in the process, although he did bowl a great bowl in the tiebreak to finish… but he lost.”

Duncan, Macatac 1: “In the absence of our first year players, we’re delighted to have been given yet another opportunity to bring on some new young talent, it’s worth the effort and rewarding watching these young kids come on, I wish I’d personally played this sport as a youngster – Great game, terrific team effort, thanks to Manning for a well organised competition.”

Mazey, Buffed Helmets: “First wrong bias tonight, stepped up and bowled it without realising what I’d done, but I did recover to bowl the winner I. The tiebreak

Carmo, Buffed Helmets 1: “I only bowled 3 ends tonight and I reckon I won all of them”

“It was a funny tiebreak, by the time Scratch came round to measure the head, everything had been moved, from mats, bowls and shoes, and somehow we won.”