Greenleys Monarchs 10-0 Milton Keynes Topspin

TOPSPIN  IN TROUBLE
 

Tough times for Topspin as we suffered back to back blackwashes after this latest outing.
 

No choppers in the Monarchs line-up for only the second time this season but stand-in skipper Martin Hall kept us all guessing as to which of the 3 Dave’s in their vast army of players might be turning out this week.   A conundrum only solved when Dave Beddall came bouncing through the door.
 

Still trying to break the jinx of always losing the first set, we tried out Russell Penn in the openers' slot this time and Topspin hearts were raised when he demolished Martin 11-8 for starters.  But it was a false dawn as Russell failed to capitalise and lost it in 4, a pattern often repeated throughout the match as we lost 7 sets in 4 games.  We gained a foothold in most sets but didn’t trouble the home boys by pushing on from there.
 

Highlight for me was coming back from 3-10 down to win against Tomek Nowakowski, shortly followed by a lowlight reversal of fortunes 2 games later as I let slip a 10-6 lead to hand over the balance of power in that contest.
 

Highlight for my team-mates, Russell and Mervyn Kelly, has to be the doubles set, never our greatest strength.  They were gifted the opening game by a catalogue of unforced errors by Tom & Martin, who then settled nicely into the game to take the next 2.  But the 4th game was a real gem for us with the Topspin lads producing a scintillating selection of winning shots to level at 2-2.  It was too good to last though and we faded badly in the 5th to sum up our night’s efforts.