National Intercentre – 12-15 March 2026

Despite each making promising starts, the North Harbour men’s and women’s teams both failed to deliver at the recent national inter-centre championships held across Auckland and Harbour greens.

After Thursday’s opening day both were in leading positions in their qualifying sections, the men’s team having started with a 3-0 win over Wanganui followed by a 2-1 win over Southland. The women were similarly well placed with first-up wins by 2-1 over the Parajacks and Dunedin.  But each team went into slumps on Friday’s second qualifying day, in which playing conditions were at their best with little wind.

Playing at Birkenhead, the men lost to a strong Taranaki side, with singles player Matt Berry dropping a three on the last end to lose to Dean Elgar 25-22, in pairs Nick Thompson and Neil Fisher were held to a 14-all draw, and the Brent Malcolm-skipped four of Daymon Pierson, David Eades and Brian Wilson lost 10-13.
The Taranaki four, as one small consolation, did contain two players very familiar to Harbour bowlers, Daryl Read and the multiple centre champion, formerly of Helensville, Bart Robertson.

The setback to Taranaki was compounded by a 2-1 loss to South Canterbury, with Berry in the singles Harbour’s only winner in that match and for the entire day.

With a 2-1 win in the last qualifying match over Gisborne-East Coast, the men did make post-section play, as second qualifier in the section behind Taranaki.  But the quarter-finals were another disappointment, a whitewash in all three disciplines to Auckland. Berry lost his singles to Aiden Takarua 25-13, the pair suffered a 22-5 loss to Zoran Bartulovich and Adam Haywood with the four achieving the best result, a 9-11 loss.

Auckland in turn went out in the semi-final, beaten by 3-0 by Canterbury, which with a team stacked with Black Jacks and national champions, including the great Gary Lawson, then crushed Wellington in the final with another clean sweep.

The Harbour women’s team failed to make even post-section play, and considering how strong it appeared on paper this was especially disappointing. The line-up comprised a world class player in Selina Goddard, another Black Jack in Leeane Poulson, a former world champion in Millie Nathan and current national champions in Lisa Dickson and Lauren Mills.  Moreover, all the players had been in excellent form in recent events, including winning national and centre titles. But even though remaining undefeated after three qualifying rounds the results had been mixed: a 14-16 loss by Millie and Leeane to the Parajacks, a 11-13 to Dunedin by the Lisa-skipped four of Lauren, Elaine McClintock and Theresa Rogers and a 24-25 loss by Selina in the singles to Northland’s Diane Strawbridge.

The slump began with a 2-1 loss to Waikato, with Selina the only winner.

That meant having to beat Wellington in the last match of the section to qualify and that resulted in a 3-0 drubbing. The Wellington women, perhaps not surprisingly, adapted much better to the blustery and challenging wind at Takapuna and won each game comfortably.  Selina, unusually by her high standards, had difficulty with her weight and though overcoming a bad start to lead 11-8 after eight ends then dropped a four on the 14th end and a three on the 20th end to lose to the experienced and accomplished former Black Jack, Lisa White.  Another strong combination of Helen King and Kaaren Guilford won the pairs and Dale Rayner avenged her recent defeat in the national fours to Lisa’s Takapuna by skipping Wellington in the fours to win 19-9 after 14 of the scheduled 15 ends.

One North Harbour stalwart had cause for satisfaction with the way the women’s championship unfolded. Centre life member Graham Dorreen added to his already imposing coaching CV by helping his friend and old team-mate, Tim Preston, take the previously unheralded Thames Valley women’s team to post-section, where it caused a boil-over by beating Auckland in the quarter-final.  Valley did lose in the semis to Wellington, which went on to deservedly claim the title, with a 3-0 win over Bay of Plenty in the final.