Melbourn won 16-7

The matches are coming in fits and starts for the 2nds at the moment – having had a 17 day gap between the previous two games (down to differing home match nights, plus an additional 7 days off for school half-term (gotta get the Skiing in!)) we were on just a four day turn around for this trip to take on Cambridge Uni 2nds.

The Uni Sports Centre is a nice venue with five glass-back courts… and it was also a busy one when we arrived to find Newmarket 2nds waiting and looking for their opponents. Er, what? It turned out the Uni 3rds were also at home in Division 4 on the same night – it was going to be a busy one. And initially a confusing one as no-one was sure which courts the two teams were meant to be on. Once that was sorted the other immediately noticeable thing was how noisy it was. This was due to the court walls only extending as high as the out line – above that is netting. And not noise-deadening netting (if such a bizarre concept exists!). Everything from the four other courts is audible as you play.

But enough moaning about trivialities, what of the action? Well, first up (in a break from tradition) was Jan Brynjolffssen (1). He was taking on Duncan Greenshields, last see by us going down 3-1 to Gareth at Melbourn in the opening half of the season. A few things were swiftly apparently. i) It was warm on the courts, ii) the ball dug out of Jan’s bag (not new, just available as no new ones were present) was apparently made of very bouncy rubber, and iii) both players were really happy playing a long driving game of attrition. We were in for some extended lung-busting rallies, often played up-and-down the backhand wall. Which made for a very clean looking game. This suited Jan, who swiftly built an 8-3 lead in the opening game. He then lost focus for a while, made some mistakes, and had to battle to convert this into a lead. But this was managed. This pattern was more or less repeated in game three, with game two done with only a minor mid-game wobble. Basically the opening pattern was maintained throughout as Jan won 15-13, 15-9, 15-13.

The first match on the other court (… of the courts that we were using) pitted our Dear Leader Colm O’Gorman (3) against Brandon McBride. Once again the patterns were swiftly apparent – Colm was the steadier and more accurate player, Brandon was a Tasmanian Devil of action as he blurred around the court chasing Colm’s shots down, especially his drops… but Brandon also had a chunk of Taz’s over-exuberance when he calmness was required to put the ball away. It came down to who was going to make the most mistakes – would it be Colm, desperately seeking a way to end rallies (he later said something along the lines of “I hate matches where I can’t kill it. It makes me feel very unsteady”), or Brandon being too loose when he got his openings. For the first game the answer was Colm making the errors [intriguingly this game has been blanked from Colm’s memory by the time we reach the Pembroke College bar!], but a more steely approach saw the second game turned completely on it’s head to level things up, and the large margin of that gave Colm the belief he needed that the patient approach, whilst painful on the lungs, was the correct one – yes, it sometimes needed five kill shots when he would strongly have preferred to play just one, but keep going for them and eventually, eventually, Brandon would fail to get one back. The strategy worked to the tune of a 14-16, 15-6, 15-12, 15-10 win.

Two match down and two to the good – Matt Walker (4) had the chance to complete the job against Oliver Johnson. The two players started on fire on the backhand drop shot, with the first four rallies of the match all ending with stone dead efforts and about 10 of the first 15 exchanges also finishing the same way. The game-plan of both was very similar it seemed – that meant it came down to execution. This was excellent news for Matt as his backhand volley drop is a think of wonder. Time and again he played it, made it, and that was getting under the skin of his young opponent, a player clearly used to his speed being high enough to chase down opponents kills. Having shaded the first Matt took complete command in the second… or rather Oliver lost his way totally as his frustrations got the better of him. That this was unrepresentative of the level between the players was soon evident as game three became nip-and-tuck. Matt was mostly behind through this, never by more than a point or two, but also almost consistently that. Whenever he closed, Oliver would find a solid rally to get his nose in front again. From behind the court one could tell that Matt was getting tense, knowing that if it became 2-1 there was every chance of the match becoming a real hot potato… but he dug in, saved a key point at game ball at 13-14 (with a backhand volley drop) and then closed things out two points later with, yes, you’ve guessed it, a backhand volley drop! Matt won 15-11, 15-3, 16-14.

The wins in the first three strings on court meant we had the 5 bonus points for winning the night overall tucked into our bags, but how many more could we add to the league total? That was something that mattered as we trailed second-in-the-table Cambridge Squash Club 3rds by 9 points going into Round 16 of matches, and they had a fixture they were highly likely to win away to bottom side Kimbolton. So there was still plenty for Sean Hamilton (5) and Gareth Jones (2) to play for.

Sean was underway first, up against Arjun Raykumar. After some initial early sparring Arjun took charge of the opening game as he found a nagging length from lofted shots that Sean was allowing to drop, in the hope they would pop out and he could get a comfortable balance to drive the ball. A forlorn hope as all that happened was the ball stayed tight and Sean had no shot. Game two saw Sean start to push himself up the court and take the ball on the full, which was key to him competing well with Arjun. This allowed Sean to establish a good lead in the game (If I remember correct it was 11-6 at one stage)… but as the dénouement hoved into view Sean’s discomfort in taking the aerial ball on combined with nerves about seeing the game out, and that meant he started to let it drop again. And that turned things on its head dramatically. Now two behind Sean found form again at the start of the third, taking on the volleys, punching the ball deep and staying calm when Arjun produced good digs out of the back conners. Controlling the ‘t’ worked very well as Sean pulled a game back… but this proved to be the limit of his accomplishments on the night as Arjun was back on it from game four, producing a high-quality display that was just too loopy and accurate for Sean’s blood. Sean lost 7-15, 12-15, 12-15, 4-15.

The final match of the evening pitted Gareth against home skipper Patrick Nickols. Gareth has been in great form this season, winning 10 times out of 12 coming into this match, something he looked to have a chance of adding to after a hard-fought, but good and patient opening game broke narrowly in his favour. This nice start proved to be rather a false dawn though as Patrick turned out to be very good… and just very solid in his movement and shot choices. Gareth began to struggle to find an exit from rallies, which led to him turning to old (un)reliable, the kill from a defensive position. This is a high risk, high reward shot, which can produce strings of kills from unlikely positions to the exasperation of Gareth’s opponents… but on other days it can also lead to a flurry of unforced errors. This was one of those ‘other’ days! It all added up to a 15-13, 8-15, 7-15, 4-15 defeat and a forlorn Gareth contemplating the effect this would have on his SquashLevels ranking, which he has repeatedly got to within a whisker of 2000 but never quite managed to turn that first digit over.