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Congratulations to Alan Spicer

Congratulations to Alan Spicer on being appointed the Team Manager of the Hertfordshire Women’s John’s and Walker Cup competitive teams. The committee and members wish every success in his new role.

The Executive is pleased to announce the appointment of Alan Spicer of Rosedale as Johns' & Walker Team Manager. Alan impressed the Interviewing Panel with his enthusiasm and plans for the future of the Team. We all wish him well in his new role.

Message to all Lady bowlers of Hertfordshire from Alan Spicer

Hi, my name is Alan Spicer and your Women’s Selection Committee have appointed me your Johns/Walker Cup Team Manager for 2019. Many of you will know me but as a very brief résumé of my experience in outdoor bowls, I play at Rosedale BC in the East Division and gained my Middleton Cup flash in 2014. This will be my third year as Men’s County Friendly and Divisional selector. I have been a vocal supporter at Johns games for a number of years and like to think I can do a good job in this role. I would like to adopt, possibly, a slightly different approach to the trials and, ultimately, selection for the teams.

My first task is to get current, recent past and aspiring players to support the trials by getting an avalanche of nominations. The Committee have been quite courageous in appointing me and I hope you will support me and Hertfordshire Bowls by nominating. I’m not sure how the trials were organised in past years but the way I want to use them is to experiment with different combinations with a mind to creating rinks of players that complement and enjoy playing with each other. The trial games will not only be meaningful, they will be used to help pick the team and rinks.

I would hope that everyone who played or was named reserve last year will nominate for the trials but what I will ask is that everyone who achieved an appearance at the Nationals in Leamington last year in whatever format, to please seriously consider nominating. This invitation is also extended to all players who have played in the Johns in the recent past but hasn’t fancied nominating again - for whatever reason. Please treat this as a new approach and give me the chance to prove that the Johns is worth playing in, can be enjoyable and that we really can be competitive with any County in England.

One message I want to emphasis is that age is not a barrier. If you’re good enough, you are both old enough and young enough.

I would also like to share with you my goals for this year. Firstly, to do better than last year – not as difficult as it sounds as we didn’t have a lot of success last year and this is, and should be, an alien feeling to Hertfordshire Ladies. For the rest, I want us to compete with opposing sides and make them apprehensive when it comes to playing Hertfordshire. We may not win every game (although we have the talent to do so) but I want us to be proud to pull on a Hertfordshire shirt and, at the end of the day, feel we tried to the best of our ability. If that happens, results will follow.

Finally, to all those who want to be a part of the best in the County, but haven’t yet been recognised, please nominate. Ever an optimist, I am hoping to be inundated with nominations and if that happens then I may have to restrict invitations to trial, but I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.

Please see the trial note regarding more details of the trials, including trialling for the Walker Cup. The trials are scheduled to be held over two Saturday mornings (until 1:30pm). Obviously, it would be better, for me, if you are available for both days but if one of them is impossible then I can live with that.

Trials

These will be held over two days, Saturday 27th April & Saturday 4th May, starting at 10:00 (but very important to report by 09:30 please for the day to run smoothly). There will be two sessions of 1½ hours or when ten ends have been played, with the session timings being: 10:00 – 11:30 & 11:45 – 13:15.

The number of trialists will determine the number of matches being played per session. It will be rink against rink and in teams. I may ask a few of you to mark one game (I will explain on the day how I what this to be approached) but that would be dependent on ‘no shows’. The plan would be for invitees to play both sessions. I would expect that in 1½ hours, ten ends will be completed but as it is time determined, it may be slightly less. Once ten ends have been played, you can stop!

The aim is to have a 28-woman squad at the end of all this who have talent, desire and belief to compete with the best. I would like to suggest the 2019 Johns Squad adopt the famous Babe Ruth quote - “It’s hard to beat a person who never gives up”

The Walker Cup squad of 10 players will ideally be selected from the Johns Squad but, because of the possibility of an outstanding player being unavailable on Saturdays but available on Sundays, this may not be adhered to. If this is the case, then nominating just for the Walker Cup is acceptable.