Lawn bowls can be played as a game for singles, pairs, triples, or fours. Each has its subtle differences. I think the most different of all games is singles where only 8 bowls total are played. By comparison, pairs rolls 16, triples 18, and fours 16. In this blog article, I will be looking at pairs in particular, but there is some application to triples and fours, but I think very little to singles.
The question I want to explore is “Can we imagine a strategy for play by the lead in lawn bowling pairs, worked out in advance, that can give an advantage?”
At the start of the game, in the first end, one team gets to choose the position of the mat and the distance of the jack from the mat. The second team gets the advantage of playing the last bowl.
At all skill levels, bowling last is considered best and the team that wins the choice chooses that their opponents ‘lead the way.' Is this the best choice?
At Premier League level- yes, but among average competitive bowlers, I suspect not. Too often the team that chooses the mat position and the length of the first jack just places the mat at the T and delivers a long or medium jack. A good pairs team should have a preferred length and mat position that is non-standard and which they can set up if they have the mat first in the match. This requires both that this strategy is understood by both team members and that the lead has practiced delivering jacks the predetermined distance.
Another point is that the lead who delivers the jack has the best opportunity to study how the jack’s path differs from a straight line along the aim line (because only the deliverer knows what the exact aim line was and how closely the throw followed it). The jack generally will run off-line towards the narrow hand. The lead can make use of this in delivering the first bowl.
An example of a strategy, (a strategy is a predetermined plan), if given the mat or selecting it, is to move it out twelve feet from the back ditch and deliver the jack a medium distance that you have already specifically practiced; delivering the jack as precisely as possible down the centerline watching to see to which side it curves. Then bowl the first bowl on this supposed narrow side trying to achieve a good back bowl about 6 feet behind the jack. This will allow one to get a better feel for the correct weight for the following three lead bowls with the lowest risk of actually wasting a bowl by throwing the first one short. With the next two bowls aim for two yard-on bowls. If either of these goes a bit short it will be one of the shot bowls in the head. Only if the lead reaches his fourth bowl without getting one within a few feet of the jack should he shorten his weight aiming for the jack's actual length. By this time the earlier bowls will have given the best teaching for the correct weight. The result after the lead has completed his deliveries should be a first or second shot and three back bowls. The lead should deliver all his bowls in the expectation that at the completion of the end the jack will have been displaced backward towards the majority of his bowls.
Most bowlers are right-handed. If you happen to be left-handed,like myself, you have an added advantage taking the jack. So long as you deliver your first bowl from a stance on the left edge of the mat a right-handed opposing lead cannot follow your track down the green. That is, your line is not available.
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