Melbourn won 11-3

Another week, another match for the Seconds, this one in Welwyn against Gosling 3rds.

First on court was Moises Estrelles Navarro (3), who had an interesting challenge as his 15 year-old opponent Jacob Hill had the potential to be quicker around the court than our Flying Spaniard. This doesn’t happen often. Jacob also had some pretty shots – one kill from the back court powered into the short forehand nick stood out as particularly well played – and seemed to have Moises in trouble when he won the majority of the opening 10-15 points. However Moises then found a streak of consistency whilst Jacob appeared to lose intensity, and that turned things around rather quickly, Moises winning a succession of rallies to build a lead and eventually claim the game to 10. The second saw Moises drop shooting more as, despite Jacob’s impressive foot speed his highly defensive court position made him vulnerable in the front corners. This tactic worked well as the entire game was played on Moises terms – a handful of errors were worth taking as the overall pattern was deeply favourable. The third was closer as Jacob dug in, and Moises arguably started to overdo the drops, counter-dropping against an opponent who hadn’t moved from the front wall. Still, Moises got to match ball at 14-11. He saw the three chances come and go, but made another at 15-14 with some more considered deep hitting, and then converted it with another ball deep into Jacob’s backhand corner that the youngster couldn’t pick out. Moises won 15-10, 15-6, 16-14.

Next on this court was Matt Walker (2) against Jon Noonan. The first started quite evenly, but towards the mid-game Matt found his range on the cut-out drop volleys – the cornerstone of his game – to power away with it. However, he was clearly never comfortable with himself on the court on this evening, and whereas the first ended with winners the second terminated in a welter of errors to level things up. Matt knuckled back down to build what looked like a winning lead in the third, 13-8 up, only to lose his way completely searching for the line, conceding 7 straight points to lose it instead! This could have been a major psychological blow, but instead Matt took it as motivation, bringing his game up several notches in the fourth which he dominated completely to level up again.
The decider started well for Matt, who carried some of the momentum from the previous game into the opening rallies, which were again finishing on his preferred play of the cut-out drop-volleys. But from the mid-game that darned finishing line wafted into view and with it the errors crept back in. To be fair to Jon he put more pressure on as well, which had quite a lot to do with the extra mistakes. In any event it was the Gosling player who reach 14 first, getting there 14-11 up. Matt saved one, saved two… but on Match Ball no.3 a perfect forehand drop from deep from Jon closed things out as Matt went down 15-10, 11-15, 13-15, 15-6, 13-15.

This meant Jan Brynjolffssen (1) was playing a decider against Pat McLaughin. Well, in theory. In practice the split on to two courts meant this one started after Matt and Jon had got underway, but finished before they were completed. The first game was over reasonably fast as Jan found he could pin Pat deep and get errors from back corners. 15-6. The second looked to be heading the same way as Jan raced into an 8-0 lead and then converted that into 7 straight game balls at 14-7. Just take one of them. OK, not that one, the next one. Maybe the next. Oh, this is getting a bit worrying now – how about playing a load of lengths. No, that didn’t work – go for a return volley winner: tin. Blast. * rallies later it was somehow Game Ball to Pat instead, but finally (finally) Jan put a chance away to save it, sending a backhand volley into the front forehand nick. He then created another Game Ball chance at 16-15. Nope. And again at 17-16. Nope again. Pat was running hard and getting everything back. More and more Game Balls came and went until it was 19-all. And then, at long, long last Jan managed to put two kills in a row together, an inch-perfect forehand drop taking the game 21-19 on Game Ball no.13!
*Phew* Don’t’ do that again. Especially no after having reverted to type for the rest of the game, punishing Pat over his backhand volley, got Jan to a good healthy lead. This time, though, once it got to 14-8 Pat coughed up an immediate error as Jan completed a weird 15-6, 21-19, 15-8 victory.

The overall match score ended 11-3 in Melbourn’s favour, which consolidated the 2nds grip on second-place in the Division 4 table – we are currently 11 points clear of third place AND have a game in hand on them.