George
I agree with the your comments about local participation being low...Apart from Matt and myself, the only other local entrant was Chris Thomas...I know Drew had other commitments, but as for other locals, I’m not aware of their exact reasons, but I do know that many locals have already committed to the Brunswick Cup which is only three weeks away or have children bowling in shield rolloffs at Shellharbour. Maybe the move to March next year may see an increase in entrants...time will only tell.
My post was Primarily based about the timing of this cancellation rather than the cause....
This isn’t the first tournament to be scrapped due to low entry numbers, however, it is the first to my knowledge, that at this level of the game, has been called off the day before the competition.
The NSW grand prix circuit, along with the Qld Sports series and other similar State Tours, represents the 2nd highest level of competition play a bowler can compete in within Australia (The Majors such as Brunswick Cup, Perth Cup, Melbourne Cup and the Super Six Tour being the elite level).
The treatment of this tournament as if it was 10 mates getting together for a couple of social games, only to decide the night before to go to the pub instead, is a my opinion, a disgrace.
But lets now look at the cause....
We all agree that numbers are low, infact, very low. The last list of entrants for this tournament posted on the forum listed approx 20 to 25 entrants.
Glen knew that numbers were low and to his credit, continued to push the tournament, as any tournament director would do.... On Wednesday, after obviously realising that numbers may not increase much higher, he made the appropriate amendments to both the tournament structure and prize payouts to now base the tournament on 25 entrants and posted those amendments stating the tournament would still go ahead....
Now, in the last week, your name was the only name that I saw on the web as a withdrawal, so unless your withdrawal caused a tidal wave of followers to also withdraw, the entrants still listed meet his new structure. In my opinion, your withdrawal should have seen a sharp increase in numbers... :wink:
Glens post in this string doesn’t highlight any facts that weren’t already known......perhaps he could enlighten us with more facts that aren’t already known...
But non-the-less, this 11th hour cancellation is still poor form, and a simple post on the forum, just shows no respect to those who did place their name down to bowl.
Bert
