Week-end Three Report :

2011/12

Weekend Three - Britannia find it tough !

Division Three South & East - Bedford Modern II (19 points out of 20) are going to be very hard to catch. Rob Swift, Mick Harper, Olivier Autin and John Alsop were 7-1 winners over Britannia Ipswich and 8-0 winners against Kingfisher II. The 7-1 win over a strong Britannia side may have flattered them slightly but it was still a performance worthy of the Table toppers. Britannia’s England no. 246 - Andy Warner was involved in two really hard-fought battles. He missed out 10-12, 11-6, 7-11, 13-11, 9-11 against Mick Harper (13/15 wins) but he sneaked home 11-5, 9-11, 11-5, 3-11, 11-9 against Robert Swift. John Alsop (who is having a fine Season with 14 wins out of 19) picked up two hard-fought wins here. He battled back from 2-0 down to get the better of both Paul Broxton 10-12, 5-11, 11-5, 11-5,11-9 and Aimee Sparkes 9-11, 4-11, 11-9, 11-7, 11-8.

Property Street Rowhedge (Steve Joslin, Andrew Mudie, Antony Greenwood and Michael Andrews) are in second place with 16 points. They recorded 8-0 wins over both Kingfisher II and Generation 2.
The 8-0 victory over Generation 2 stood out - after all Generation 2 (12 points) are in third place. But, it was the Colchester side who made the running on this occasion. All four Rowhedge players impressed with Michael Andrews (13 wins out of 19) judged to be the Player of the Match for his 11-9, 11-3, 9-11, 11-5 victory over Mike Rhodes and his 12-10, 9-11,11-5, 7-11, 11-5 win over Daniel Lucking.

Generation 2 did better against Hastings in match which finished tied at 4-4. Three players won twice - Generation’s Mike Rhodes and Hastings’ Dave Butler and Jon Wilson. Dave Butler (six wins out of eight) was on top form. He powered his way past Ross Saxby 11-5, 11-5, 11-4 and Roger Hookey 11-4, 11-9, 11-7.

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2010/11

Our British League team did reasonably well despite limited player availability in the latest round of matches which took place last Sunday [16^th.Jan.’11] at St.Neots.

With the non availability of Gary Young, Ian Brown and Aimee Sparkes, the team was “auto selected” on simple availability – the teams numbers 1, 3, 6 & 7 respectively  – so certainly not the strongest of possible squads.

However, lead by Andy Warner winning his two and with Paul Broxton winning one, a welcome return to form saw Ken Lewis also win two to give the team a superb 5-3 morning win over Urban Progress. It also gained Ken the ‘player of the match’ award, Ken having had to ‘dig in’ stubbornly in order to succeed.

The afternoon match saw Paul fight bravely against Steve Kerns, twice coming back from a game down only to loose narrowly in the fifth end.

 Andy followed on in what was probably the best 5 setter British League contest seen for some considerable time when he took on the fast improving and highly ranked England junior, Bradley Tuttle. With both players playing open table tennis, there were numerous long and often spectacular rallies, and by the culmination, play on the other tables paused to witness an awe-inspiring display of table tennis at its best. Andy having won what appeared to be the final point and with it a sensational victory, Tuttle queried that he had served a let serve and although Bradley was the only person in the room to believe this to be the case, Andy very sportingly agreed to play a let. Tuttle went on to win the next three points and can count himself extremely fortunate to have secured victory.

With Jason having an off day going down again three straight, it was Ken who tried to stop the rout, fighting back from two down to 2-2, only to loose the vital fifth end.

Andy then beat Steve Kerns in another five set cliff-hanger to get Britannia on the scoreboard, but when Paul lost out in the next match, a drubbing looked to be on the cards. However, despite his final opponent being the illustrious Tuttle, Ken’s awkward pimpled play gave Tuttle considerable trouble and Ken led 10-6 in the first end. Unfortunately, Tuttle’s luck from earlier continued with him taking the next four points with nets, and taking the game 12-10 with yet another net. Tuttle then took the next, again aided by the net, but Ken didn’t give up deservedly taking the third. So 2-1 to Tuttle when it just might have been 3 straight to Ken – what a result that would have been ! However, it was not to be and Tuttle took the forth with consummate ease.

The final scoreline of 7-1 was indeed flattering to Ellenborough, and didn’t really reflect just how close most of the individual contests had been.