‘Talking Tactically’

with Lachlan Tighe..... 

(a weekly edition, commenced 12/9/2001, of thoughts, observations and commentaries on developments for bowls coaching and competition)

‘ Observations at Australian Open’   

(edition 134  - 2005 of thoughts & observations on lawn bowls)

The qualifiers for the Australian Open commenced last Friday and as I type it is Tuesday and the ‘real’ start of the event.  Thus I have to make some observations on skill with the coaches hat on (I separate and exclude my general critical comments so as to furnish them direct to the organizers).

Tactical skill:

One frustration I have with bowlers is the nonsense of simply copying what other bowlers do without due thought to the reasoning. In this case it is the handing over of the mat so as to get the last bowl. One state player was 11-0 down after 5 ends, wins a shot and his first end and duly hands the mat to the opponent.  That opponent then rolls the jack exactly as he had done to sprint to 11-0  and blow me wins the next end, again. Why would’nt he ? His confidence in the choice of length is reinforced by the scoreboard.  Yet that state player has followed what so many concur with that it is advantageous to have last delivery.  Maybe in the sudden death ends, but in the 9 end sets get out and dominate the rink.

Technical skill:

The greens at times were quite slow and the number of times I saw players make no obvious change in their step, speed or arm swing and continue to wonder at their continued short bowls make me wonder if players know the aspects that change distance when they are under the pump.

Mental skill:

Craig Fox and Neil Barras would have frowned at the minimal amount of mental skill with state level bowlers out there on the greens during the qualifiers.

One triples team I watched epitomizes all that I reckon has to change in bowls.  Three skips with quite different approaches formed as a triples team and the animosity and tension was unbelievable. We could hear the annoyance amongst them and all the body language only added to the verbal messages. The question you have to ask is why did they ever team together, this is the Aussie Open. Gee with the Elbows squad part of the skill is to choose appropriate team mates for such events.

To soar with Eagles don’t mix with turkeys (where you have choice for team mates).

One young gun triples team with two Aussie level players really surprised me as they play very well, as you would expect, heck when it came to team spirit it was no where to be seen, as they are simply three talented individuals who linked up as a triple and surprise surprise they are no longer in the event. This is the real weakness in the game of bowls, the inability to merge three hot shots to form as one team, playing the role expected for the event.

Lesser skill players resort to verbal (negative) expression a sure sign they are under pressure. Again at training players need to be instantly discouraged from informing everyone of their crap bowls.  We can see that, blind Freddie can, so stop practicing that (bad) habit.

I am host for the Malaysian squad this week and Jo, Karen and Sharon from New Zealand and David Holt (England) were generous enough to come over to train with the Malaysians on Monday evening and you can see why the NZ gals, David and Lina all won Commonwealth gold medals as their application to discipline at training was noticeably superior to anyone else, best seen by them being the last off the green.

Finally, a positive.  The state players from WA I observed (Tristan, Pete, Clive, Brett) at two venues exude all the positive team spirit that the other bowlers at elite level could well and truly learn and apply. Team games are all about the other people in the team.

P.S. A moment to gloat – our ‘Elbows’ squad of 8 males and 8 females has 13 of the 15 who entered the Open playing as of today Tuesday given their cumulative successes these past 3 days, mighty proud

Lachlan Tighe

ATTITUDE: ALL ABOUT PRACTISING HABITS