It has been an interesting week at Paulton Bowls, with an influx of new members and interested parties, unusual weather and a visit from an influential friend.

To start, Tuesday we played with a mixed team in the Floodlit Charity Competition at Purnells ground against Prattens where, despite a rain delayed start and a fair amount of surface water to add interest to the play, a good tempered and fun game was had by all concerned and the players much appreciated the after match refreshments provided.

Thursday, the ladies played a league match at home against Wells, but unfortunately lost on all three rinks. Whilst on Saturday the men also playing at home, in the County League against Frome Selwood, lost overall by just two shots in a closely contested well humoured match in which we won on two of the three rinks.

Friday night is as always club night, and it was good to see this event thriving again with new members and families and old hands making up a full fun filled green. During this time several of the players, using especially altered eye glasses, experienced some of the problems partially and non sighted competitors have when playing, making us aware how difficult this is whilst also causing some hilarity, with yours truly being told I played better when wearing them!

The highlight of the evening was a visit by Neil Dalrymple, CEO of Bowls Australia and soon to be CEO of World Bowls, who is in the country for the Commonwealth Games, and had a personal tour of some of Britains Bowls clubs, before taking up his new post, ours being the magical 50th club.

Neil had a guided tour of our establishment before having a Roll-up, with several of the members and after enjoying the evening refreshments, and discussions gave a short but interesting talk on how he envisions the possible future of lawn bowls, how to attract young players and why it should be included in the Olympic Games, somethings to cogitate on in the future development of our clubs and well worth keeping an eye on the World Bowls website.

The evening was rounded off with a darts game for members old, new, and visitors.

Finally an early shout out for a Macmillan charity tea party to be held at the club on the 9th of September, further details to be given in next weeks write-up. AJ.Meaton