Thursday 9 December 2010

Three's home v Dalgety Bay 3(Thurs, Dec 9,'10)

Dalgety sportingly let us know days in advance that they had only 3 players and would fulfill the tie anyway. And they turned up at 7 for a 7:30 booking, well warmed up.
I reffed #1 Cockburnator v Scott Boswell, a guy who makes our "young" guys look old. Pete had a few unforced errors to lose the first quickly. In the second, Scott just soaked up Peter's best shots and threw them back in his face to go 7-2 up. Then Peter really started slotting winners that had to roll on the floor to stop the guy getting them back. He fought back to 8-8 but Scott got a handout and finished it better. Pete didn't have much left in the tank and Scott took the next game and the match 3-0. Bloody good match though.
So we still needed a win at #2 or #3 to get the bonus points. Duncan Walker at #2 was his usual steady self against Neil Shepherd but still found himself 2-1 down and it wasn't looking good. He got even steadier, if that were possible, to level it and ran away with the fifth: 3-2. Man of the Match.
At #3, Gordon Sloan turned up with one shoe. He looked like he was playing on one foot in the first as Colin Boswell started with intensity 9-2. Gordon put on his game face to level it and playing some sublime volley-drops and counter-drops, went 2-1 up. He went back to playing on one shoe for the fourth, then woke up at 3-8 down and looked to have the momentum only for Colin to level it. Stung, Gordon re-focused and left Colin for dust in the fifth: 3-2. A gripping match with some great sportmanship and skill from both.

Overall 17-9 and we're heading back into mid-table safety with 3 or 4 consecutive wins. Topics discussed during the pizza fest were: who has the coldest courts in the league and whose shoes will the Sloan Ranger fill next week.

No comments: