MONDAY NIGHT SUMMER LEAGUE WEEK 8 ROUND-UP
Published 16/07/2019 at 12:24:29 by David Wackrill.
DIV 1
Howsmall 5 Towcester 0
Warriors 3 Aylesbury 2
Spinners 3 Phoenix II 2
Confidence was running high in the Towcester camp ahead of this week’s fixtures with in-form Ian Brown proclaiming that he “fully expected” to topple Howsmall ace Nick Howard. Ian recorded a great win last time out against Michael Wilkins and only two points separated Nick and Michael on the last listings of the National Mens TT365 rankings (2311 to 2309 points respectively), so plenty of reason for optimism there. And when Ian roared into a 3-1 game lead he was well on course for victory too, only for a stubborn Nick to fight back to take the set in the decider. So, no win there but Ian went on to an even closer encounter with Guy Sparrow, leading 3-1 in games (again) and 10-5 in the 4th only to lose after holding 8 match points!! Despite having the lion’s share of the luck on the night, Ian couldn’t quite get over the line. Nice try though. Gary Deakin joined Ian on the Towcester team and won 5 individual games himself without taking a set. So, a hard fought whitewash for the Champions.
The time has come at last for Aylesbury to celebrate their first doubles win of the Summer, this against Warriors, although it wasn’t enough to secure victory as the Tim Cheek/Ben Rolfe combo found Michael Wilkins in top singles form. Michael was giving nothing away and dropped just a single game from the 9 he played. Tim beat Ricky Taiwo for Aylesbury’s other win.
Finally, this week saw promoted Phoenix II take on the big boys for the first time, Mervyn Phillips and Cazacu Valli both beating Spinners’ Pete Tillotson for excellent wins. However Alan Cherry was a step to far for them, forcing Mervyn to start the night with a couple of zero scores into the bargain too.
Player of the week is Ian Brown.
Table
Howsmall (35 points)
Warriors (27)
Spinners (20)
Towcester (16)
Aylesbury (14)
Phoenix II (8)
DIV 2
(courtesy of Mike Ainsworth)
Sweet and Sour 3 Phoenix I 2
Tornadoes 2 Hit n Hope 3
Blades 2 Classics 3
Topspin 1 Stormers 4
The second half of the Summer League division 2 got underway on Monday evening and all eyes were on relegated team Phoenix I, who replaced their second team who were deservedly promoted to the first tier with a 100% record in the first seven fixtures. With a three point advantage carried over courtesy of their team-mates Phoenix I started the evening as hot favourites for the title, particularly as Ioan Constantin was unbeaten at this level last summer. Unfortunately, to quote Robert Burns, the best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry..
In their first fixture Phoenix I faced Sweet and Sour, who lined up with regular Julie Snowdon and week six debutant Zheng Wei Gong who had seen off the in-form Dylan Cox in his first match. And Zheng Wei Gong proved that he is going to be tough to beat at this level with 4-1 wins against Gerald and Ioan, and so with Julie winning against Gerald, Phoenix crashed to a shock 3-2 defeat. Ioan gained a single win for Phoenix against Julie and teamed up with Gerald to beat Julie and Terry Lau in the doubles.
Hit n Hope have been on the wrong end of three successive 5-0 defeats which has seen them tumble from third in the table to sixth and they were keen to see the run end against Tornadoes, who had already defeated them by 4-1 in the opening fixture. This time Hit n Hope fielded their strongest team for only the second time this summer and with a singles win apiece for Ivor Howard and Marco Hahn together with a great recovery from 3-1 down in the doubles to win 4-3 Hit n Hope have ended their barren run with a 3-2 win.Nicholas Wong was in unstoppable form for Tornadoes with two singles wins but a rather rusty Tanmay Tijare failed to register.
Second placed Stormers were once more without Dave Wackrill for a tough return fixture against Topspin, who they edged 3-2 in their first match. But If they had any concerns they were swept away by Andy Smith’s double (I’m told there might have been an element of luck in the 4-3 win against Mervyn Kelly) and a single win from Chris Belton. A win in the doubles gave the Stormers team four points on the night and edged them to within a point of Phoenix I at the top of the table. Russell Penn scored the sole win for Topspin.
In the battle of the bottom markers there was a repeat of the opening fixture result with Classics winning 3-2 against Blades. Another brace for Dylan Cox and a single win for Nick Markham. Bill Tyler won against Nick in a tight 4-3 win and teamed up with Brian Evans to take the doubles for Blades.
Player of the week: Zheng Wei Gong
Week 8 Table
1) Phoenix I 32
2) Stormers 31
3) Topspin 25
4) Sweet and Sour 25
5) Tornadoes 15
6) Hit n Hope 15
7) Classics 11
8) Blades 6