Melbourn won 17-6

The Seconds returned to action against Comberton determined to get back to winning ways following a sobering first defeat of the season last week at Swavesey (in fact only four days prior to this match due to the away game being on a Thursday and the home one on a Monday).

First on were Gareth Jones (4) and Sean Hamilton (5), who were both up against handy teenagers in the shape of Isaac Broughton and Connor Harmer respectively.

Connor was making his debut in the adult county leagues but showed few signs of nerves about this as he proved a tenacious opponent for Sean. The Melbourn player kept opening slight leads, but each time he expected Connor to fade the kid instead came roaring back. It didn’t help Sean that his natural style of pacy hitting was rather to Connor’s liking – Sean had much joy with lobbed up balls, particularly on the serve, but was patently never entirely comfortable doing this as he didn’t trust his accuracy on such shots! However experience is a handy tool and Sean was able to grind out the opening two games narrowly. He seemed to be on course to do the same in the third, getting to a 10-7 lead, but then started to push for the finishing line… which was allowed Connor to use his pace to counterpunch winners. This proved to be the high watermark for the Comberton player though as his lateral movement began to slow in game four, which, even if this was only from highly impressive to merely very decent was just enough to see Sean’s crosscourt widths start to turn Connor around. And that was enough for Sean to run away with it, completing a very hard-fought 15-12, 15-13, 10-15, 15-8 victory.

Things were just as nail-biting next door as Gareth had his work cut out dealing with Isaac’s solidly consistent game and fleetness of foot around the court. Whilst Isaac exuded consistency Gareth’s form was typically a bit more fluctuating, with the old pattern of winner, winner, winner, error, error, error back in frustrating evidence. In part this was Isaac’s doing as Gareth couldn’t just rally with the kid as however fit he is (and his fitness is decent) he was never going to outlast the Duracell bunny that was his 16 year-old foe. Going for winners made a decent amount of sense, especially when it was working as it did for extended spells… but the same approach also left Gareth’s teammates shaking their heads when it absolutely didn’t (tin “Don’t do that!” tin “stop doing that!” tin “don’t do that again” tin… D’Oh!). The first two games were traded, and the next two were just as close, but in the end experience did out, just, Gareth winning 15-10, 9-15, 15-13, 15-13. And looking very relieved to have got out of it 3-1 as well.

Liam Murphy (3) followed Gareth on to Court 1 as he took on Richard Anthony. Liam won the first game by outpacing his opponent who wanted quick and done rallies. However Liam's concentration slipped with some stunning finishes by Richard in the second and he took it. The third and fourth games saw Liam slow the game down, draw out the rallies and tire out his opponent. This approach delivered an easy win for Liam and saw out the match, winning the games to 6 and 8, closing out a 3-1 winner.

Meanwhile next door Jan Brynjolffssen (2) was struggling against a familiar opponent, Jeremy Cotton (known all over the Cambs Leagues as Jez). Jan had started the first game last week by falling 9-0 down – this week was 33% better as he was only 6-0 behind by the time he got a point on the board. The cause was different this week – it was Jez’s racquet skills, particularly his straight backhand drop. Jan never really got a handle on that in the first game, which he dropped heavily but started to figure out that he simply couldn’t allow Jez a half-court ball from the second on. Easier said than done on a consistent enough basis to prevent it ever happening – Jez getting to attack on at least every other rally, and his confidence was soaring so he wasn’t missing. Jan fought as hard as he could, but ultimately just couldn’t deal with the short stuff and lost 6-15, 12-15, 11-15.

The final match of the evening pitted Miles Jeanneret against Alistair Maclean… and it was apparent after about two rallies that this was a complete mismatch. Miles was dictating the rallies to Alistair, who simply didn’t have the fitness to constantly defend this and hope to gradually turn rallies around. Instead the Comberton player was forced into going for kill shots from unlikely positions on the court, often whilst off-balance. Even when these went up, and they often didn’t, Miles’ speed of movement was such that he could retrieve the kills anyway. It was extremely hard for Alistair to win a rally; him taking a game was never even a remote possibility as Miles cantered to a 15-4, 15-2, 15-4 win.

Skipper for the night Jan said “The team all played well. OK, most of us did. But it was good to get a win again after the shock last week. Three wins out of four prior to the half-term break is a very encouraging start to the season.”