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The papparazzi invaded the Club Dinner…. …were you caught!

Tania is back from injury and had a tough match in the first round of the British Open. Find out more here.

Listen to Tania on Lincolnshire radio talking about how she got into squash.

Following Stamford Squash Club’s success in the Peterborough District League in which all three teams gained positions in the top three in each division, a tour to Edinburgh over the weekend of 19th – 21st May was arranged.

Matches were to be played against the Edinburgh Squash Club on the Saturday, and following a rest and relaxation period overnight in Scotland’s capital (aka “a night on the town”), a further series of doubles games on Sunday before returning to Stamford.

All places on the tour were filled within days of the notice being posted and a squad of 16 players duly made their way to Peterborough station on Friday morning for the three-and-a-half-hour journey to Edinburgh.

Karen Cozens has supplied a superb banquet for us to enjoy on the way up! The 2 organisers Dave Spooner and Lawrence Ball did all they could top make it an entertaining journey splitting the 16 of us into 2 teams – the competitive nature of us all had started!

Once we arrived at Edinburgh, there was bowling arranged and a few other competitive games, so it was a quick look at the view from the hotel and then straight back out!

First off was the bowling, with the 2 teams – there was a competitive match between all, with Jason Rudkin winning the fastest speed just short of 25mph.

Next up was a bit of light entertainment, Air Hockey, Dancing, Shooting and more….

Later on that night Paul wonders if his training regime is such a good idea. Anyhow after managing to get back to the hotel it was a day of squash to follow.

While Stamford may well punch above its weight in the Peterborough District League, the opposition north of the border proved a little tougher. The excellent facilities of the Edinburgh Squash Club were more than matched by both the hospitality and the high levels of skill demonstrated by its squash playing members.

When play commenced on Saturday, in what turned out to be an indication of things to come, Stamford’s no. 1 Jonathan Hand went down in a decisive 3-0 victory to Edinburgh’s Simon Boughton, both players demonstrating superb levels of accuracy and inventiveness.

At No. 2 Alastair Gunn’s skilful and deceptive game achieved no better against Richard Snowden at 0-3, while Glynn Williams at No. 3, almost tasting victory at 8 points to 3 in the fifth game against Adam Ralston, saw his lead slowly whittled away to finally lose 10-9 for a slightly more respectable (for Stamford) 3-2 result to Edinburgh.

Paul York, at No. 4, produced his usual flashes of brilliant and quicksilver play but failed to clinch the fifth against Graham Lind – another closely fought 3-2 to Edinburgh.

At No. 5 Simon Barker’s hard cross court drives and blistering boasts won him no more than a 1-3 defeat at the hands of Edinburgh’s Charlie Robertson, while brother Richard Barker at No. 6 achieved a slightly better 2-3 against Richard Melliso.

Six games played and only three near-misses for Stamford – the pressure was building up for the remaining ten to achieve a win.

At No. 7 Martin Brewin’s unconventional game of lobs, back wall boasts and outrageous deception finally achieved a 3-2 scoreline against David Ireson – Edinburgh 6, Stamford 1 – was the tide turning?

Peter Hand, on at No. 8, while failing to keep the winning streak going, did achieve 2-3 against Dave Shaw in this the first of two matches played, heroically achieving a 3-2 win in his second match, this time against Les Wilson.

At No. 9 Dave Spooner, while taking Eric Hogg to a fifth game with his hard left –handed floor-skimming cross-court drives, failed to close his opponent out; another 3-2 to Edinburgh.

Lawrence Ball at No. 10 achieved no more than one game against a determined Bruce Johnson; 3-1 to Edinburgh, while Ian Burnham at No. 11 fared even worse against a confident Ashley Mears: a 3-0 result to Edinburgh; the tide was turning back!

Martin Shippey, playing at No. 12 managed a 3-1 win against Edinburgh’s Moira Atkinson, a score which husband Paul Atkinson promptly avenged by beating Kim Cozens, playing at No. 13, 3-0.

Finally, Ferlin Barnard, benefiting from his intense training regime during the weeks prior to the tour, achieved a well-deserved 3-2 against Edinburgh’s Keith Barwell.

The final result for the day.

Squad members Tim Prior and Jason Rudkin, although not playing because of injuries gamely supported their team from the balcony, so with a total of 15 games played Edinburgh won 11 and Stamford 4; certainly a decisive win for Edinburgh, but with 8 of the scorelines at 3-2, clearly a hard-fought tie.

After hard squash games – some had a snooze – they will remain nameless, though pictures tell no lies! AND look what it says on his t-shirt, — PARTY!!

The local drinking establishments were waiting for us and so a tour of the city followed….

The following day doubles game was played by all – and cracking matches resulted without too many injuries!!

After lunch it was time to leave Edinburgh and head back to Stamford but a great time was had by all – much due to the hospitality of our hosts at Edinburgh Sports Club!

Finally, as mentioned earlier in the report – we were split into 2 teams and the photos taken at the beginning really did show who were going to win all the way along……
- the team that know how to position themselves for a photo!!

Stamford go down 5 nil.

In general terms the least that is said about last night’s drubbing the better. Report writing this week is even further impinged as the writer was first on and the length of that tie was such that all other matches other than Glyn “the Gaylord” Williams’ had been played on the other court by the time his match was over.

First on were Alastair Gunn and Simon Richardson playing at 2 and 4 respectively.

Alastair seemed to ignore the fact that his opponent was a lefty and proceeded to try and out rally Dylan Ross for most of the match on his extremely powerful forehand. Having said that Alastair sneaked to an 8/7 lead in the first but despite approximately 82 game balls failed to close it out. A mighty effort in the 2nd saw Alastair take the second 9/7 having been 0/6 behind and then take the third 9/5. Dylan then snuck back into the game dictating the pace from the front with accurate and deceptive play to take the next two 9/4 9/3.

Simon battled hard against Dave Batterby and despite a hard push to take the second struggled to cope with Dave’s droppy lobby game and went down 2/9 10/8 3/9 1/9.

It took the time that Simon was in the shower for Mike Coogan to see off Dave Spooner 1/9 3/9 1/9. Dave was seen after the 7 minute 15 second tie rubbing tap water into his shirt to make it look as if he had done some running.

Fine performances were put in by both Jonathan Oakley and Glyn Williams who were both unlucky not to get a result the other way. Jonathan lost to Paul Partington 2/9 9/4 7/9 5/9 and Glyn was narrowly defeated by Justin Fowler 7/9 9/6 2/9 9/6 2/9.

We finished the match at 9.15pm, as we arrived on time at 7.30pm courtesy of Tim Schumacher. It is obvious that we gave them a good stuffing!

The highlight of the evening for some, may have been the cross dressing by Tim and John in the changing rooms, but the squash was more important for me. However I must admit that John was dashing in his new briefs and Tim was all the rave, with his yawning posterior gaping out from John’s delicious castaways!

Anyway back to squash:

Me, John and Paul hardly broke sweat and were looking for a game afterwards. Dave tried to break sweat with some deft underhits and I couldn’t be bothered to ask for the let tactics, but with cunning experience, he wafted away the pensioner he was playing with (his opponent).

Tim had the only game worth playing and what a game! Down 2/9 and 4/9, he dug out an incredulous comeback to 2-2. Unfortunately he pulled a knee ligament and became a hobbling cripple. All seemed lost as Tim went down 0-7 and a hobble became a worse hobble, and we all said from the balcony ‘you can do it Tim’ yeah. And believe it or believe it not Lazarus was born, with grit, graft, determination, courage, bravery, and team spirit (do you like all this crap?), Tim was magnificent and point by point got to 7-7, then 7-7, 8-7 and 9-7 to complete a most remarkable recovery, which must go down in the record books!

Stamford 5, St Neots 0

For the record the results were:-
Paul Swift beat Mike Biggs 9/4, 9/2, 9/2
Dave Spooner beat Colin Taylor 9/5, 9/7, 9/7
John Fields beat Andy Beattie 9/2, 9/2, 9/2
Paul Redfern beat Dave Bettany 9/4, 9/0, 9/0
Tim Prior beat Andy Fenner 2/9, 4/9, 9/1, 9/7, 9/7

This was always going to be a tricky tie and a real team effort was going to be required to pull off a victory.

First on court first were Kai and Simon, again playing respectively at 4 and 5.

Kai showing the sharpness around the court that had won him the invite to join the ranks of the Stamford 1 team cruised comfortably to a 9/4 9/3 9/2 victory against Chez Alenanno. Kai’s clear enthusiasm for the game must be causing some concern for his very pregnant wife at the moment. Not only is the young man constantly out playing for every Stamford team in the Peterborough leagues but he is clearly spending all of the nappy fund on flashy new bats and go faster hair highlights.

Kai’s solid performance was followed by an equally masterful display by Glyn Williams who comfortably dispensed with his opponent Martin Meadows 9/1 9/0 9/2.

Meanwhile Simon Richardson was battling hard for what proved to be the pivotal tie. His opponent Dave Reweder tested Simon with a closely fought first game which Simon just managed to squeeze 10/8. Some great squash ensued, good hard length broken up with delicate finishes from both players. Dave took the 2nd 9/6 and whilst the next two games were closely contested Simon (who can always pull something special out of the bag when the pressure is on) held it together taking the last two 9/6 9/4.

Three matches having been won the victory was in hand with only Alastair and Jonathan Oakley left to play.

A number of supporters had turned up to watch the evening’s play – none more interested in the outcome of the next match than Lawrence and Dave (having been left out of this week’s line up).

The captain dragged himself onto court barely recovered from a weekend spent on the large white (well more aubergine) porcelain telephone whilst the vultures gathered eagerly on the balcony. What followed, to the eye of the knowledgeable squash follower, was a tear jerking tragedy. The usual display of powerful penetrating squash just wasn’t there. Whilst bravely fought and distracted by the cries of “drop him” from Dave “ten bellies” Spooner the result was inevitable as Edd Hale snatched a 9/1 9/5 9/5 victory.

The two Jonathans were left then to educate and demonstrate their court prowess. For the first game, at least, the older looking of the two (Mr Oakley) looked like having a sniff of a chance and top spun dropped his way to a 9/6 opening game victory. The next couple of games were coloured a little – JO, shielding his embarrassment at being constantly wrong footed in front of a packed house, bitched like an old woman. The petulant display, normally associated with teenage spottiness, however did nothing to improve his game (the under sized ladies shorts can’t have helped either). Increasingly tired the old timer could do nothing to hold back the tide as Jonathan (the younger) closed out the remaining three games in decisive fashion 9/3 9/4 9/3.

The team retired to the Green Man for a well earned celebratory pint allowing Mr Hand to eat his third dinner of evening and Mr Oakley to whinge about the unfairness of being expected to thank his sponsor by wearing the team shirt.

THE WINNER:

RUNNERS UP:

The Stamford Squash Club Finals, a culmination of competitions held through out the season with players ranging in age from 8 to 60 plus, was recently held at the club courts. Afterwards the trophies were presented by John Plant.

The Junior section was the first to be played, with the under 11′s starting proceedings. Liam Barnard and Sam Olver overcame some dogged resistance from Edward Barlow and Joseph Chedd in the semi finals to reach the final. The two juniors played with great skill with Liam dominating the front court he raced in to a 20 – 14 lead however Sam regained his focus and power to pull back to within a point , the comeback was short lived with Liam producing a powerful backhand drive to take the honours 21 points to 19.

The over 11′s final was a family affair the first of three, between Josh and Will Goodwin a competitive tie with Josh prevailing 3 games 0. The victory testament to his many solo training sessions.

The juniors were presented with their trophies by Stamford Squash Clubs World Ranked ladies player Tania Bailey and were later privileged to play against their hero.

The Copperstore on the night competition resulted in a father and son final between Paul and his son Sam Desbrulais. Sam playing with great skill made all the running pushing his father to all areas of the court and eventually won 15 points to 7.

The Super Veterans competition for the over 55′s was won by Mick Lewis who’s contrast between power and a delicate lob serve proved to much for fellow finalist Maurice Mosdell. The Super veterans plate competition was won by Graham Wright whom beat off a gutsy performance by Roger Banks 3 games to 1.

The veterans competition for over 45′s saw Graham Wright beat Maurice Mosdell in the plate competition 3 games to 0 for his second trophy of the day.  The final of the veterans competition was a tense affair between Dave Battersby and Mark Davies. Mark took a comfortable 2 games to 0 lead however Dave pegged the score back to 2-2 and the fifth game was a classic in which Dave had the edge and won 9-5 to win.

The Handicap final produced some exhilirating squash between Ian Burnhams driving game and Pauls Smith touch and lob style. Paul started on plus 1 to Ians scratch score with American scoring to 15 points each game. Ian took the first game and it was not long before the spectators realised that this would go to 5 games as Paul rallied and took the second it was nip and tuck all the way with the score in games reaching 2-2. Paul started the fifth the better of the two but Ian clung on, the score proceeded to 14 -10 in Pauls favour , Ian dug deep and played some of his best squash to take the tie 15-14.

The Chase Plate competition for all players played with normal scoring was the culmination of the day. The plate competition with John Fields being pushed hard by Lawrence Ball and the score of 3-0 did not reflect how hard this final was.

The main event the final of the mens competition was contested by Paul York and his brother-in-law Richard Barker. Paul was looking for a record 10th mens title and their was trepidation in Richards play . Paul took the first game comfortably. However, Richard pulled himself together narrowly losing the second and then changed his tactics by playing more drop shots and took the third. Richards mobility made the fourth game eventful and his retrieval was something to behold. But Pauls power and experience took the fourth game and his tenth Championship 3-1.