Bowls North Harbour OPEN Ivan Kostanich Men’s singles – 20 & 21 September 2025

  • September 22, 2025

The immediate future of the sport was revealed at Hobsonville at the weekend when two young bowlers, both not long out of the one-to-five ranks, contested Sunday’s final of Bowls North Harbour’s Ivan Kostanich Open singles tournament.

 Harbour’s Matt Higginson, from the Manly club, achieved the biggest win of his career, beating Auckland’s Stephen Campbell, from the Howick club, to win the title in straight sets.  Higginson has been a dominant player in Harbour junior events in recent seasons, while Campbell has been equally prominent as an Auckland  junior champion and like Higginson a regular representative at that level.

 Their potential has been quickly recognised with Campbell in the Auckland open and development representative squad and Higginson having been selected in the Harbour development training squad.

 For his win at the weekend Higginson won first prize of $800 and Campbell for finishing runner-up, $400.

In the semi-finals both scored impressive wins, with Campbell beating the surprise packet from Manly, Bruce Shirley, and Higginson gaining the scalp of the redoubtable Tony Garelja.  Now one of the West Aucklanders who have bolstered the Riverhead club, Garelja, before crossing the bridge, so to speak, had achieved almost legendary status in the Auckland centre, having earned two bars to his gold star.

 Shirley, while virtually unknown in the Harbour centre, also has a solid background, having in his younger days picked up 16 North Otago centre titles, mainly in singles. But after moving to Auckland 20 years ago he drifted away from the game, until returning recently to Manly.  He obviously has not lost too much of his old touch for he downed some well performed bowlers on his way to the semis, including a Manly club-mate Paul Daniels in straight sets in the quarter-finals.

 For their efforts Shirley and Garelja were rewarded with $200 each.

 

 Earlier in the round of 16, both Campbell and Higginson had beaten accomplished and experienced bowlers, Campbell over former Auckland representative, Nick Thompson and Higginson over Steve Hoeft. Both Thompson and Hoeft are now with Birkenhead, adding to that club’s considerable depth.

  The standard of competition was high, with both of last year’s finalists, the winner Brian Wilson, from Birkenhead, and the runner-up, the Auckland club’s Adam Haywood, early casualties in post-section play.

 Yet another Birkenhead player, Willie Tonga, made the quarter-finals, only to be beaten by Garelja.