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Saturday, March 2, 2019

An Unlawful Delivery at Lawn Bowls



At one of the places where I am visiting in Portugal, one of the bowlers uses, very effectively, a delivery technique which I had never seen before, at any level of lawn bowling, from the club level to the world championships; neither indoor nor outdoor. He starts standing, feet together, one stride behind the mat. Then, in one motion, he steps forward onto the mat, sets his foot on the mat and as he takes a second step forward with the normal advancing foot he releases his bowl. As he releases his bowl one of his feet is either fully or partially on or over the mat.

I was curious why I had never seen this done before. On further investigating I found the reason. Every such delivery is a foot fault! The pertinent law of the sport of bowls reads:

7.1          Before delivery a player must be standing on the mat with all or at least part of one foot on the mat.[my bold italics] At the moment they deliver the jack or a bowl, the player must have all or at least part of one foot on or above the mat.

Now what should I do? This gentleman has been bowling this way for years. I presume no one has ever called him for a foot fault all this time. He has probably never played in an officiated tournament. Should I speak to him about it off the green?
What would you do?  

2 comments:

  1. Interesting delivery.. much more akin to alley bowling. Is he effective?

    I don't see any upside of talking to him given he's not likely to be a serious (ie tournament) bowler. I somehow doubt it'd be well received - or likely to change behavior.

    ReplyDelete

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