THE defeat by a pleasant chap some 13 years older than myself was heavy and humbling - a snapshot (if they still have those in this digital age) of life in the cut-throat world of Veterans' League bowling.

You may remember that I told you at the beginning of the current season that I had rescued my mildewed woods from under the stairs and joined a local team in the (vain) hope that the passage of a couple of decades since I last played would have effected a miraculous improvement in my performances on the green.

After losing 15-2 I emerged from the bowling hut with a cup of tea to overhear a conversation between my conqueror and an incredulous team-mate.

"Did he have a dog?" was the question put to the victor.

Well, no. And it is perhaps as well that I did not have a white stick handy or I might have been spurred to violence.

As it was, I made a joke of it and went off to sob quietly in a corner.

There have been a couple of wins so far this summer and that - just about -enables me to describe my fortunes as "mixed".

But the truth of the matter is that most of the people I have played have been good bowlers for many years and still retain a competitive edge which will never leave them, in spite of various problems brought on by ill-health and old age.

Last week my opponent informed me that he had suffered two strokes which had affected his sight and balance.

Inevitably, this was not apparent in any way and I was hammered 15-6.

Still, the overall experience is interesting as I visit park greens around Bolton and read the graffiti on various heavily-fortified bowling huts.

Hopefully, the perpetrators will eventually display as much life-long staying power as the doughty campaigners who enjoy many a sun-kissed afternoon defeating young pups like me.

Mr Tony Blair, who retires as Prime Minister this week, is too young to be a veteran bowler (you have to be 60) and something tells me that he is unlikely to spend future afternoons on bowling greens eschewing round pegs because he is famously a "straight kind of guy".

My verdict on his decade in power, for what it is worth, is that he deserves credit for sticking with an impossible job in the face of constant criticism (justified in the case of the Iraq fiasco) which would have destroyed many a man or woman with less talent, resolve and charm than him.

I think he has been a dedicated Prime Minister who has done his best.

We have not seen the last of him on the world stage and I believe that is a good thing for modern Britain - the subject of an excellent BBC television series presented by journalist Andrew Marr.

Even when losing at bowls I have to agree with his verdict: "To be born British remains a fantastic stroke of luck."