Percy Jones

Percy Jones, born in 1912, took up bowls in 1943. He became one of the great names in New Zealand bowls and went within a whisker of winning a medal at the 1974 Christchurch Commonwealth Games.

Jones, one of the pre-tournament favourites, finished 4th in the singles in a field of 14. A final-round drubbing 21-8 by celebrated Englishman David Bryant, the gold medallist, was the final nail in the coffin, but really Jones, who began the competition well, came unstuck when he lost 21-20 in round 8 to eventual silver medallist Clive White of Australia.

In a dramatic finish after a see-sawing match, White drove off Jones’s shot bowl with his last delivery to score the narrow victory. That result set the Australian on the path to a medal and lengthened the odds considerably on Jones getting among the medals.

In the end, Bryant won well, White was second and three bowlers – Jones, Willie Wood of Scotland and Mal Evans of Wales - all finished with nine wins from 13 matches, with the Wood pipping Jones for the bronze by a mere 0.05657 of a point, on a countback. The defeat by White and then the scale of his final loss to Bryant badly damaged his chances.

Christchurch was Jones’s second Commonwealth Games. In 1970 in Edinburgh, the Aucklander was in the New Zealand four with Gordon Jolly, Bob McDonald and Robbie Robson. Curiously, the four never clicked, yet they were all fine individual bowlers and at the same Games McDonald and Robson won the silver medal in the pairs. The four could finish only 11th, with eight losses and four wins.

Jones was also in a seven-strong New Zealand bowls team that was invited to tour South Africa in 1969, a first for the sport.

He figured prominently in national championships for many years and Sports Roundup radio listeners became very familiar with the fortunes of Percy Jones of the Otahuhu Railway club. He was very loyal to the club, as befitting a person who spent so much of his life working as a welder at the Otahuhu Railway Workshops.

Jones won two national singles titles, in 1967 and 1973, two in the pairs with clubmate Joe Miller in 1967 and 1969 and the fours title in 1965 with Alby Cotton, Gordon Macrae and Miller.

It put Jones into the elite company of bowlers to have won five or more national titles and so earned a Bowls New Zealand Gold Star, which sat alongside the Gold Star he earned in Auckland championships.

Percy Jones was married to Ona and they had two children. He died in 2001, aged 89.