Berkshire Squash Winter League

Match reports from last weeks 5th round of games in the Berkshire Squash Winter League. The 1st team had no game whilst the 2nd and 3rd teams were away to Datchet & Windsor 2 and Tadley respectively.

Maidenhead 1 - No Match

Current standings in Division 2B are:

Maidenhead 2 vs Datchet & Windsor 2

Maidenhead 2 are becoming accustomed to competing in "top of the table" clashes, and this week we took on Datchet and Windsor 2, previously unbeaten in this league.

I think I say this each week, but I suspect we fielded the strongest 2nd team we have ever put out...we just had to win!!!

James made short work of his opponent. Alex saw off his opponent, despite a bad back, in a more lung-busting affair. Jason also came out on top in his match to take an unassailable lead in the match.

Damian came through 3-0 as well despite being game point, or something close to it down in every game. Not sure if it was a masterclass in determination, or in bottling...maybe a bit of both!

It was left to Mark E to see if he could deliver a clean sweep of 3-0s. He was up against an opponent, Karl, who had beaten him on 2 previous occasions. Mark had not been impressed to see that their regular #1 (on paper at least) had pulled out thus pushing Karl up to #1.

Some fantastic squash saw Mark go 1-0 up and 8-2 up in the 2nd only for Karl to haul him back and take it 10-8. It looked like Mark had lost his spark after Karl took the 3rd game comfortably but he fought back valiantly to take it to a 5th. He continued to put everything in, but a number of very effective cross-court drops helped Karl take the 5th.

So a 19-3 victory which puts us comfortably at the top of the league!!

Individual Scores were as follows:

And the current standings in Division 3B are:

Maidenhead 3 vs Tadley

The 3rds were away to old rivals Tadley in a 3rd place vs 4th place match-up which would decide whether Maidenhead 3 could keep pace with the top 2 teams in the division or slip down the table.

Managing to field a pretty strong team we were quietly confident we could nick this fixture and things got off to a solid start with straight forward wins for Jerry Dunn and Richard Ives at #4 and #5 in the order.

The next two matches on court were Mark F at #2 and Andrew E at #3. Unfortunately it became quickly apparent that Mark F was suffering an illness in his game but he battled valiantly on in an attempt to win a point for the team. But suffering quite badly, Mark effectively conceded the match 3-0 and quickly headed off home to recover.

Andrew meanwhile was in a personal battle with Jon Wilkinson's old sparring partner Gavin Nutty whose game appears to have improved over the past few months. Andrew struggled to find his rhythm early on and conceded the first two games to Gavin who was hitting a pretty solid line and length.

However Andrew fought back to take a hotly contested 3rd and then subsequently found his form and got the measure of Gavin to take the next two games comfortably and the match 3-2.

This gave us the win we needed with Janak left to play. His opponent, David Thomas, is a very strong player and with a lack of recent matches, Janak struggled to find his usual measured and accurate game.

The result was David managed to pick Janak off with a good solid display and take the final match 3-0.

Overall a good away win which sees Maidenhead 3 secure the 3rd spot in Division 4B and a real chance of stealing a top 2 position before Christmas.

Individual Scores were as follows: