21 July 2014
A Star News Group Publication
Jaymie has the X Factor
Fun in the snow
Property liftout
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INSIDE
CONVENIEN CE AND QUALIT Y
Monday, 21 July 2014
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Gifkins guns it By JARROD POTTER JORDAN Gifkins is the toast of South Springvale Soccer Club after the 18-yearold goalkeeper struck the winning penalty in a 9-8 Dockerty Cup shootout victory. The 18-year-old from Eltham starred in the cup semi-final as he skilfully deflected a number of difficult saves before sealing Aris’s spot in the grand final with an heroic effort in the final showdown. Gifkins will forever remember his pair of match-saving stops against St Albans Saints in the shootout before he was called upon to take the final penalty kick. The keeper eased back and slotted the goal as black-and-yellow celebrations began in the stands on Wednesday night at Heidelberg’s Olympic Park ground. For more on the Dockerty Cup semifinal, turn to Sport. Picture: JARROD POTTER
Clubbed by tree A TREE that has long enriched the backdrop of Dandenong’s oldest continuous sports club may have sown the club’s destruction. Dandenong City Bowling Club, tucked in the shade of a majestic Algerian oak in Dandenong Park since 1882, faces potentially playing out its final end at its site this season, president Greg Payne said. As the oak has flourished, spreading its root system as far as the Princes Highway 50 metres away, so the club’s greens have withered dry and become unplayable in summer, Mr Payne said. “We think it was planted about the
same time as the club started. In summer, it’s absolutely magic to look up underneath it - I can imagine monkeys playing around in the tree. It’s magnificent. “Our forefathers wouldn’t have realised how much damage it would cause.” Talk of relocating the club started in the 1940s but that was because its membership had outgrown the site. This coming season, membership stands at an all-time low, possibly as few as 15. Mr Payne said it was because of the patchy greens - “the laughing stock of Bowls Victoria”. Treasurer Leigh Makings said the club’s low numbers also reflected Dan-
denong’s changing demographics and interests; two of its members were in their nineties. Their suggested rescue plan for Greater Dandenong Council to install a synthetic green was rejected. The club has faced down threats before - floods, the widening of Princes Highway, a clubhouse fire – but without an artificial green, it can’t survive on the site beyond next year, Mr Payne said. Greater Dandenong community services director Mark Doubleday said the council was prepared to split 50:50 the cost of the proposed green, estimated from $250,000 to “well over” $400,000.
However the club could not afford to contribute its share, he said. The council had looked at “remedial action” to protect the greens but that could inflict harm on the tree – which is seen as a “significant asset”. “Discussions are being held with the club about the possibility of locating with another existing club, such as Keysborough, Burden Park or the Dandenong Club,” Mr Doubleday said. “This has involved extensive planning and ongoing consultation.” Councillor Matthew Kirwan said the council should make a more generous offer to the club. “I think having the bowls club and croquet club there are assets which
should be supported by our council. “Due to council inaction in supporting this club membership has dwindled, so I think we should offer them a better deal given that we are partly responsible.” Under the council’s 2007 Dandenong Park masterplan, it is proposed to relocate the bowls club and nearby croquet club and kindergarten, making the site open space and protecting the Algerian oak. It stated the bowls and croquet clubs were a “choke point” that narrowed views and constrained movement to the park’s southern end. Club kept bowling along, page 5.
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