Grange 5 vs Waverley 3

Last night was the eagerly awaited chance to beat the table-topping Waverley 3. Or not.

Played on the night of the storms, I was a little concerned to arrive at Accies to find the car park closed and most of the lights out. We parked on the main road and then risked life and limb to walk like a drunkard to the sports centre to find everyone else there waiting. Unfortunately, I'd left my bag in the car so had to make the trip twice more. Even St George's courts would have felt warm after that.

This week, our arctic adventurers were Mike (me), Neil Love, Dave Gibson, John Matthews and Bill Marshall.

First up were John and Bill. John, in only his second match, started well and seemed to have the measure of his opponent moving to 6-4 before an almighty crash with a wall left him impersonating Sylvester with little Tweety Pie's circling his head. This clearly impacted his game and it's probably best to pick this game up 19 points later with John 6-9, 0-9, 0-5. As the pain subsided he had a mini-rally to 4-6 before losing 4-9. Stiff shoulder, pained looks, but you should see the wall!

On the other court Bill was clearly intimidated by his opponents shots during the warm up. But as they started the match it felt pretty even. But while his opponent took a point here and there, Bill struggled to score on his serve and lost 1-9. The next two followed a similar pattern with Bill having plenty of serve opportunities, but not getting that run of points and went down 4-9, 4-9. Best of the action was a handful of precision drives straight to his opponents racket, who had given up on the back wall, when a drop would have been a winner. Key stat? 34 serves and only 9 points, it was a lot closer than the score suggests. 0-2.

Dave Gibson was next in his third ever match having won the first two comfortably. But his opponent was just too quick and crisp and the game was over in a trice 3-9, 0-9, 1-9.

Neil was meanwhile puting up a stronger show after losing the first 1-9. But his opponent was again too strong and that was over 4-9, 5-9.

So, 0-4 down and it was just after 8.30pm. We weren't sure if Franco's served pizza this early, so Neil went to check.

Last up me. Captain and facing a whitewash - no pressure then.

My opponent looked perky, not as in Pinky, but as in eager, quick, fast, lithe - you get the picture. The first game was cat and mouse and after 15 serves the score was 2-2. But some uncharacteristically tight play saw me pull into a lead and close it out 9-6. Phew, the quintuple bagel was off. The second was a similar game and was won 9-7. Now by this stage, my opponent hadn't broken sweat, which I wasn't sure was a good thing. The next game over quickly 1-9. Unfortunately, the next two were identical with close play to 4-4 before superior fitness and talent brought up 4-9, 4-9.

So, all in all just 4 points from the evening. But at least I managed to postpone the pizza call to a respectable time of the evening.

Worth closing with a comment about the great spirit the game was played in. Good game and good banter. Thanks guys, and good luck with promotion.

Mike

-