Holders Cold Norton B set up final clash with club’s C team
THE Burnham & District Table Tennis League Handicap Cup will be heading back to Cold Norton this year after the holders set up a final against the club’s C side.
After winning the cup last year, the Cold Norton B faced a mixed Woodham B and C team and secured a 5-2 victory.
Ian Wall (-18), Eric Green (-16) and Dan Anderson (-12) overcame to big handicaps to secure the win.
Cold Norton C opened up a 3-0 lead in their semi-final against Division Two outfit Blackwater A before going to also claim a 5-2 success.
There was limited league action due to the cup activities this week but the games that were played were significant in the run in for the top slots in Divisions One and Two.
Mapledene A bounced back to the top of Division One following a 7-3 victory over their B team.
Needing to keep the pressure on their championship rivals, the A team seemed to be heading for a much higher score as they went 5-1 up at the break and family combo Gary and Daniel Young took the doubles for an overall 6-1 lead.
The only blot on their copybook being Gary Young’s loss to Simon Jacob in the opening match of the night.
In the final three singles, the B team’s Keith Willett used all his know how and general wiliness to come back from 2-0 down against Daniel Young to square things up at 2-2, and then to 10-10 in the decider before winning the most unexpected of points.
In the penultimate match, Jacob and Peter Barrett went to five sets also with Jacob Barrett coming through 11-4 in the decider.
In the final match of the evening Gary Young faced the awkward John Monk. Monk was in this one and had a chance to take the match to a decider when at 2-1 down and deuce in the fourth set, but Young held strong and won out for his second win to secure a 7-3 triumph to take Mapledene to the summit.
Reigning Division Two champions Mapledene C hosted current Division Two leaders Woodham C this week in a match where Mapledene needed an extremely good win to stop the party celebrations continuing.
At the break, the match was evenly poised at 3-3 with Mapledene’s Barrie Delf and Woodham’s Adi Kamma the only two unbeaten players.
Delf in particular had to work extremely hard in his long five-set victory over Woodham’s David Meah. Meah then lost in another five-setter against Lin Roff as the match was levelled up at 3-3.
However, Woodham went on to win the remaining four matches to secure a 7-3 success to leave Woodham 20 points clear with only four games to play.
In the clash of the Stow teams this week, the B side outwitted D team for a 7-3 win. It was no surprise that Peter Hance was once again the star man for the Stow B side with yet another hat-trick.
However, it was a surprise that the D team’s Tim Pulham only won once as he beat Dave Marsh coming from behind in a long five-setter.
In Division Three, Maldon F beat two-player Woodham E to widen the gap at the foot of the table. A notable evening for Kym Eames as she took her first hat-trick and player of the match title for the season in the 7-3 victory.