Bazza won B-grade in Saturday's stroke round with a fantastic score of 93-31-62, a score that has not been seen in individual rounds at Merrigum for quite a long time. He was four shots ahead of the A-grade winner Andrew Wood who scored 76-10-66, in itself a great round.
Bazza's form at the moment is better than a purple patch, perhaps around violet on the visible light spectrum, as he regularly makes the headlines these days. Fortunately for the rest of us the new handicapping system finally got a hold of Baz with his GA handicap being reduced by almost four shots.
He also became the club's first victim of the "exceptional nett score" inclusion in the new system where he lost an extra shot for playing eight shots better than his handicap. Just to cap a good day he took the jackpot for nearest the pin on the 12th. As already mentioned, Woody had a top round to win A-grade with what on any other day would have won him the honours.
Ball competition winners were Bill Bray with 68 and Bruce Brown 71. Other nearest the pins went to James Campbell on the sixth and Bruce Brown on the ninth. Frank Leyden won the chook shed challenge with 12 points.
Barry Webber started his week of glory by winning twilight last Thursday with a score of 48-15-33. There is no shame in being runner-up to Baz at the moment and Phil Barca was that with a round of 45-8.5-36.5. He also took the nearest the pin on the 14th, while Russell Dunn took the jackpot on the ninth. Bill Bray won least putts with 15 and the two point cut was 38.
Merrigum's pennant team ventured to Hill Top on Sunday to take on Rushworth with nothing less than a win needed to earn a spot in the final. It was certainly a good situation to be in where that finals spot was entirely in the club's own hands and not dependent on other results as it was the previous week.
Merrigum came away with a great 4-1 win to earn a place in the final against the east pool winners Tallygaroopna-Cosgrove by virtue of games won, ahead of Hill Top Red which finished equal on points. Winners were Simon Doherty-Barry Webber and James Campbell-Clint Prygoda both 5-4, Ash Sanders and Cory Berghofer 2-1 and Andrew Wood and Phil Barca 2-up. Greg Hall and Bruce Brown went down 3-1. The final will be played at Mooroopna this Sunday with hit-off at 8 am.
Good luck to the team to continue the club's good run in recent pennant competitions. Good luck to the selectors tasked with choosing the side too. For those unlucky not get a spot in Sunday's team, just remember you have been a part of getting the team to the final.
Saturday's event is the final round of the Phil Savage-sponsored summer four-ball and will be aggregate par.
