Chris posted this to the Notts and Australian lists yesterday, but since not everyone is a subscriber, here's a copy of his report.

Whakatane - day 2

Just back from an interesting day at Whakatane. It was my first visit to this club and I must say I was impressed. All the members were friendly and keen to help and learn. The club is situated in a picturesque location and have four full size lawns and a smaller lawn. The lawns were running at around 9.5 seconds and had brown patches and green areas which made an excellent test for positional play. You had to hit the ball down the line you wanted and then adjust the pace depending upon what colour the grass was. The susbsoil was fairly firm and once the hoopsetters knew that they weren't setting the hoops to 4-5 64th's they did an excellent job all day. The ladies provided excellent sustenance all day and the club as a whole were friendly and welcoming - I recommend a visit.

One very unfortunate incident occurred when the Tournament Manager placed a 30 minute time limit (the manager may only impose time limits in exceptional circumstances) on the third game of a match when the score was 3-1. Both players appealed, meaning that 25 minutes were lost whilst the appeal was held. The appeal was rejected and the players agreed a draw.
We have absolutely no time pressure for this event. Most of the lawns at Mt Managanui are empty by 6pm and it gets dark around 8.45pm. I hope that the Manager will realise his mistake and allow the two players to complete their match during the next 3 days. It is exactly this type of failure to put the player's interests first that needs to removed from the sport. I am sorry that an international visitor has been subjected to this.

The play at Whakatane was mixed. The Drew v Gee match had lots of powerful clearances and long hoops, with Will taking the first only for Phillip to take the match. Shoukry played some great stuff to take a 5-2 lead in the first against me, but I was able to win in straight games.
Tobi Savage played a great jump through 12 to come back from game down and beat Darren McLoughlin. He then thrashed high seeded John Christie 7-1 in their first game before succumbing in the next two.
Bottom seed Carl Uhlman took the first game off Shoukry, but couldn't quite make it in the second and then lost the decider easily.

The weather has been glorious and so far, not too windy. Incidents at HQ included a yellow card for Reg and a wasp flying up J-P Moberly's shorts and stinging him - better not to ask where!!

I'm sure Jenny will post a report from Katikati when she gets home.

Chris