Melbourn lost 3-9

Melbourn 2 travelled to St. Albans on Tuesday evening to take on Nuffield 3 in what proved to be a competitive and eventful tie.

3rd String – Rafay (Nuffield) vs James Storer (Melbourn)
The evening began with James Storer up against promising junior Rafay. James started strongly, building a commanding lead in the opening game, only for Rafay to fight back impressively and force a tense tie-break. James held his nerve to edge it 17–15. From there, the Melbourn player grew in confidence and control, taking the second 15–10 and running away with the third 15–5 to secure a 3–0 win and give Melbourn the early advantage.

2nd String – Keith Winfield (Nuffield) vs Sean Hamilton (Melbourn)
Next on court was Sean Hamilton, facing experienced campaigner Keith Winfield, who had been playing much of the summer at 1st string. Sean put in a strong effort in the opener, pushing Keith all the way before narrowly losing 15–13. Keith’s class then began to show through as he dictated the play in the next two games, taking them 15–11, 15–7 and levelling the tie for Nuffield with a 3–0 victory.

1st String – Jonathan Smith-Squire (Nuffield) vs Will Bradshaw (Melbourn)
The top-string clash rounded off the night with plenty of drama. Nuffield’s Jonathan Smith-Squire was making a long-awaited return from injury, while Melbourn’s Will Bradshaw stepped up to 1st string after a full day of hockey training. Despite the disadvantage, Will worked hard to stay in contention, but midway through the first game he suffered a nosebleed which interrupted play. Returning to court after treatment, he battled on but Jonathan closed out the game 15–8. The problem resurfaced in the second, leaving Will off court for some time. Against advice to retire, he bravely improvised with a tissue bung and played on, completing the remainder of the match despite the setback. His determination was admirable, but Jonathan’s strength told as he secured the match 15–8, 15–10 for a 3–0 win.

Result: Nuffield 3 beat Melbourn 2 by 9–3

Though the scoreline went in Nuffield’s favour, the match was competitive and played in good spirits. The evening was rounded off in fine style with both teams enjoying pizza, beers and limoncellos at Nonno’s in the heart of St. Albans.

Melbourn lost 6-10

The 1sts wrapped up their Herts Summer League campaign with a re-arranged match away at Haileybury School … but not against public school pupils – the Haileybury club serves the local community in the Hertford and Hoddesdon area.

First on court was Jan Brynjolffssen (3), who took on Karl Pyle. These players are definitely not school age – Karl commented pre-match that they have been meeting regularly in the county leagues for 20 years! In all of those combined Jan has probably not hit as many front wall nicks as he managed in a bizarre knock-up, when he succeeded in finding the join on at least 10 occasions. This continued into the first game, but balls pinging out aside Jan put in a good showing to move a game up. The second was tighter, but Jan edged it out to secure a 2-0 lead, mostly through high energy play.
Sadly he wasn’t able to continue the intensity into the third, instead making a bunch of errors to fall into a massive deficit. It started with serving out on the opening point, and devolved from there. And with that the match turned, as Karl got his tail up, and began lifting his serve high, which set a pattern Jan didn’t seem able to turn around – the court position had changed with Karl now in front and Jan scrambling. It all added up to a frustrating 15-9, 15-12, 5-15, 8-15, 8-15 defeat that left Jan thinking back in irritation to his lax start to the third when he was comfortably ahead.

One string down, the pressure was on Mark Oppen (2) as he took on Alistair Paul. Game one saw Mark trying to work his way back into things in his first team match for a while, work having taken him abroad for nearly two months.
The opening game saw Mark taking things a bit carefully as he re-found his feet – the slightly lack of pace and intensity in his play was enough for Alistair to power through. However, Mark upped the voltage for the second, building a good lead and then clinging on to the end of the game as he tried to take it easy for the last bit; this one made it clear that both players had to be at 100% at all times to pocket games. Not the ideal for Mark whose match fitness hadn’t been helped by two months living the Indian hotel life.
Despite the challenges the inner dog in Mark shone through in the third and fourth, both of which were nip-and-tuck all the way, each needing breakers to settle. Mark pulled off several extraordinary shots, as is his wont – some of them spectacular, others spectacularly odd decision making (… but not necessarily ineffective for all their right-angles-to-realityness). Alastair was keeping things more level, but that wasn’t getting either player clear. It came down, in the end, to utterly fine margins, but margins in Mark’s favour as he claimed the third and then the fourth, after a multitude of match-balls, to wrap up a 10-15, 15-12, 16-14, 18-16 success.

That meant the top string was the decider… and it was also a meeting of old friends as Miles Jeanerret (1), on walking in, had discovered he was due to play an old Bath University teammate, Alex Fuente.
Back in the day Miles had been the higher ranked player, but Alex looked sharp and fit in an energetic first game that went his way. Miles was taking things a bit too steady, which is his game but was something Alex was exploiting well. More dynamism in the play to take the front position worked in the second as Miles began to dictate the exchanges rather than react and defend, which upped the number of errors coming from Alex’s racket. The game was secured… but the problem was playing at that intensity for a full hour was too much of a physical ask – games three and four slipped away at an increasing pace as Miles tired. It ended in a 11-15, 15-13, 7-15, 4-15 defeat and one up for Alex over a former teammate.

That meant the overall score in the match was 10-6 to Haileybury. This meant both teams had comfortably made their targets for the night: the hosts had been looking for at least 3 points to avoid finishing bottom of the table, whilst Melbourn jumped to fifth in the final table when we got to 4 points (12 would have moved us up to fourth, but Dear Reader, that is a mere detail).

Melbourn lost 6-10

The penultimate match of Herts Summer League Division 2 sent the 1sts to St. Albans to take on Nuffield 2nds.

First on court were Jan Brynjolffssen (3) and Mark Castle. A nervy first game saw Jan struggle to find his lengths, whilst Mark was more consistent into the back corners, the home player winning it 15-11. The second was even tighter, breaking Jan’s way 15-13 after he fought off a comeback from Mark towards the death; a number of game points came and went, but on the last a mistake allowed Jan a loose ball to put away.
The third was the best of the match as Jan managed to keep it away from Mark’s reads and force his opponent into the deep corners instead. However, this proved a false dawn as Mark won the fourth, and then took the fifth after a tie break, as two saved match balls from 12-14 counting for naught. Jan lost 11-15, 15-13, 15-9, 12-15, 14-16.

The other two strings were both played over a PAR-11 format as time was now pressing – Jan and Mark had eaten up over an hour for their string. Melbourn struck back as Matt Sampson (1) picked up a win over Tim Bloomer, taking the first two comfortably (11-3, 11-1) but then seeing a concerted effort for the home player give him the third (6-11). However Matt dug in to win the fourth 11-9 to complete the victory.

That meant Miles Jeanneret’s second string clash with Andrew Green was the decider. Unfortunately the styles didn’t work in Miles favour as Andrew high pace, high attack game saw rallies end before Miles more cerebral version could take effect. The first game went past in the blink of an eye (6-11) and whilst the second was closer (9-11) it still went Nuffield’s way. For game three Miles fought fire with fire, rather than with ice, and this worked to the extent of 11-9… but he had burned himself out doing it and lost the fourth 11-4 as Nuffield took the spoils on the night.