Sloan team up into second

Our Sloan Trophy team has climbed into second place on the points table after a gritty win over Nelson at Tasman on Sunday (June 7).

The 6 ½ to 2 ½ victory means we are just 2 ½ points behind early leaders Greenacres after three of the scheduled nine rounds. Our two-win, one-loss record is one of the best starts we have made to the competition in some years.

Sunday’s win owed much to the strength of our middle and upper order after our juniors recorded just a half and a loss. Warwick King and Murray Lauchlan ended up all square after a see-sawing encounter during which both players squandered opportunities to take charge. Aaron Kotua lost 3/2 to Tom Pyatt after being behind most of his game.

No 4 Jonathan Tuheke staged an impressive comeback to defeat Dave Harley 2 up. One adrift after the front nine and two down with four to play, Jonathan put on the after-burners to win the remaining holes and power to victory.  His fellow intermediate Peter Green made a memorable Sloan debut, shooting 73 off the stick to smoke a shell-shocked Ron Fyfe 9/7 to add to the momentum.

Dean Goodman, playing at No 2, got dealt to by on-song Johnny Corby 6/5, who putted superbly, leaving the outcome of the match down to the battle of the No 1s. Keri Kotua was up early against Keir Wilkinson who pulled it back to one down at the turn and all square with three to go only for Keri to sink a 20 foot curler to edge ahead and birdie the last to close it out 2 up to secure the extra points.

In other results, Greenacres thumped Totaradale 8-1, Golden Downs crushed Murchison by the same score and Takaka pulled off a major surprise in holding Motueka to a 4-all draw.

The points table after three rounds has Greenacres leading on 19 followed by Waahi Taakaro (16.5), Takaka (15), Totaradale (14.5), Motueka (13), Nelson (11), Golden Downs (10.5), Tasman (4) and Murchison (2.5).

The next round is at Greenacres on June 21 where we play Golden Downs.

ends