PREMIER / DIV 1 ROUND-UP WEEK 11
Published 04/12/2023 at 12:37:21 by David Wackrill.
PREMIERTITANS TRIUMPH IN BATTLE OF GIANTS
The big match this week was the MK club derby between Titans and Spinners. A close encounter was always on the cards after an early Gary Jones win and so it proved with Titans surviving an Alan Cherry maximum to squeeze home 6-4. Two wins each from Craig Brown and Guy Sparrow, one from captain fantastic Nick plus the doubles secured a handsome victory for the League leaders over their closest rivals. Bad night for Jecu Aurelian who left with a blank. Great match all round with both Craig and Nick extending Alan to a deciding game.
Another 6-4 result came in the basement match between MK Phoenix and Greenleys Glory. It was the 11th straight defeat for Phoenix but at least the result was in doubt until the final set this time when Glory’s star man Ian Mead saw off Alan Bolding in straight games. Mervyn Phillips had kept the match alive in the penultimate set when beating Jacob Midson 11-9 in the 5th. 2 a-piece here for both Mervyn and Phoenix team-mate Ioan Constantin while for the Glory boys it was another hat-trick for Ian M, his usual doubles win with Jacob, and singles wins for Jacob and Iain Lindsay over Alan. Are we a step closer though to Glory fielding an all Ian/Iain side though?
The remaining matches both ended 7-3. In the Greenleys derby 3rd place Monarchs beat a 2-man Warriors side in 4th slot. Monarch in-chief Tomek Nowakowski was unbeaten while team-mates Dave Tiplady and Martin Hall lost out to ace chopper Ricky Taiwo, who also took the doubles alongside Shrishlal Basant Rai.
Finally at Wing on Friday Leighton Buzzard Generations beat MK Sasaki, now struggling in the relegation zone, with hat-trick man Hakan Karaagac again their outstanding player. Antonina Bohach and Ben Rolfe gave support with a brace each. For Sasaki, Minesh Pitamber beat Ben (in 5 games), Michael Wilkins beat Antonina (also in 5) and also won the doubles with William Kit Liang.
Player of the week : Alan Cherry
DIVISION 1
‘LEVELLING UP’ TIME
It was top two versus bottom two this week, not that a random spectator at either match would notice which side was which as both contests were close run affairs. In any case, the standard throughout the division is pretty uniform and the current ‘bottom two’ are probably in as much as a false position as the top pair.
This time round leaders MK Topspin managed to overcome the stiff challenge of the ever improving Greenleys Princes, who have made some impressive new signings, picking up more points in the last month than my Topspin side, and arriving for this match with their latest star recruit, Saish Prabhu. Topspin relied heavily on the excellent form of skipper Russell Penn to get over the line with a straight games hat-trick in a 7-3 win, which was backed up by a brace each from Mervyn Kelly and myself. New boy Saish beat us both and won the doubles with Saravana Kumar. Gary Viner was the other Prince.
Meanwhile, last placed Leighton Buzzard Van Hire were holding high flying Open University Primes to a draw. Fabrice Spelta hit a straight games maximum of his own and won the doubles with Dave Broome, leaving Mateusz Browarnik to pick up the remaining point with a deciding game win over Ning He. Patrick Wong and Andy Tan bagged a brace a-piece for Primes.
Chackmore continues to be a veritable fortress for the Hasbeens side as MK Pumas, divisional leaders this time last year, became the latest team to perish there. A 2-man Pumas unit of Chris Belton and Adam Snowdon lost 7-3 with a brace from Chris and one from Adam. Hasbeens gave a first team debut to Div 6 sub Freddie Burman alongside regulars Bub Burman and Andy Whitehead. Bub was unbeaten as usual, Andy beat Adam and it was back to winning ways for their own, much praised, doubles partnership.
3rd placed MK Sharks were also held to a draw in their match with Leighton Buzzard Avengers. Yet another straight games hat-trick here too, with Alex Du Noyer doing the damage for Avengers. Dwight Edwards chipped in with a crucial 12-10 in the 5th game win over Sharks’ Abhay Tijare and, in the final set of the night, Avengers secured the draw with a Steve Jordan 4-game success over Sarah Hudson. The Sharks sets came from Derick Rodrigues (2), Sarah (1), Abhay (1), and the Derick/Sarah doubles combo.
Player of the week : Fabrice Spelta