Division 2 Roundup - Week 15
Published 20/02/2022 at 17:51:10 by Martin Johnson.
The season has headed into its final third, as teams start to play each other for the third time.At the top of the table, joint leaders Milton Keynes Sharks were at full strength, hoping to open up a gap on Woburn Sands Mosquitoes, who had a gap week, in their match against sixth placed Little Horwood Wooden Tops. However, they were surprisingly held to a 5-5 draw, despite the usual maximum for Derick Rodrigues, who extended his winning run to 12 sets. Rupert Greyling also partnered Derick to the doubles win, and scored one win himself, against Andy Hooper in five games, but a fine all round effort from Wooden Tops saw two wins each for John Sharp and Paul Reynolds, plus one win for Andy against Pedro Anastacio, to secure the draw, and pulls Wooden Tops seven points clear of Shambles at the foot of the table, although still thirtenn points adrift of the team above them..
Thirtd placed Newport Pagnell Lagondas visited Mursley Hawks in fifth. The two teams had previously had two close matches, and it was no different this time, with the final result a 5-5 draw, to keep Lagondas seven points back from the leaders. Tony Ardis was in fine attacking form for Lagondas, grabbing a superb treble, without the loss of a single game, to take his winning run to five sets, and he was backed up by two wins from Chris Horn, although Chris was pushed to a fifth game on both occasions, but losing out in four games to Martin Johnson. The Mursley pairing of Martin & Ian Spanswick outlasted Chris and Roy Read in the doubles, in another five gamer, and Ian and David Bartlett each picked up one win for the home team, to leave the final scores level.
The one win of the week went the way of Leighton Buzzard Spitfires, although it had not looked so likely as they stood 1-2 down to Milton Keynes Shambles early on, after Steve Jordan had edged out Graham Silversides in five legs, and Jim Robinson had beaten Dwight Edwards in four. Filip Simek showed them the way, though, with his opening win in straight games over Nick Markham, and continued on his way to a fine maximum. Graham and Dwight won the remainder of their sets, too, although Dwight was pushed to close in the decider by both Nick & Steve, but with Filip / Graham also taking the doubles against Steve / Jim, it meant a final score of 8-2 to Spitfires. Shambles are now seven points adrift at the bottom of the table, whilst Spitfires have closed to with a single point of third placed Lagondas.
Players of the Week : Tony Ardis and Filip Simek.