Thursday 21 February 2008

2nds vs Waverley 20th Feb 2008

Not that much to report, really.

The team of Cockburn, Dutton, Sinclair, Tweedie and Hannay we're all had 0-3 results versus Donny Hay, Mike Read, Paul Oczinsky, Allan Ramsay and Colin Cruickshank respectively.
All matches went exactly the same way with the stronger Waverley players simply being too tight and consistent for their Grange 2 counterparts, all of whom were playing a few positions above normal on the night. Nobody was badly beaten and we nearly snuck a couple of games but couldn't argue with the 0-18 result in the end.

Wednesday 20 February 2008

Firsts home v Watsonians 3 (Tues 19.02.08)

A good contest, but we lost this one. Bad news is it will take a minor miracle to beat Colinton after that. Good news is that we have secured second placed and promotion to Division 2.

Stokesy, who made as much work for the referee as his opponent, Mike Callaghan, won 3-2.
Gerald, went down 2-3 to Ed Murray.
Christy had a frustrating time with Jim trickle boast Dougal 1-3.
Al had a good shot at Ali Carruth, but got nothing, 0-3.
Man of the match Mike Perring played a steady game against Mike Sinclair, 3-2.

Overall 2-3, 11-17 on points.

Franco did food. Closing balance for subs is £24.15. Suggestions so far are a) team night out on the town with Stokesy or b) reinvest into a crash course in drop shots for Chris Mair.

Man of the match: Mike P - the trusted Perring formula combined with some good speed around the court did the trick! And he is expecting a baby - apparently this was announced a fortnight ago, but I hadn't quite realised the full magnitude of what he had said. Congratulations to all concerned. That's going to be tough with the division 2 training regime!

Tuesday 19 February 2008

Firsts home v Watsonians 3 (Tues 19.02.08)

A good contest, but we lost this one.


Stokesy made as much work for the referee as for his opponent, Mike Callaghan, winning 3-2.
Gerald, went down 2-3 to Ed Murray.
Christy had a frustrating time with Jim Dougal 1-3.
Al had a good shot at Ali Carruth, but got nothing, 0-3.
Mike played a steady game against Mike Sinclair, 3-2.

Overall 2-3, 11-17 on points.

Franco did food. Biggest bar bill of the season.

Man of the match: Gerald. An impressive result against Colin Boswell - a tough opponent who will run and run, given the chance. In past meetings with Grange, he's won most of them and taken a game of Alan Hamer!

Friday 15 February 2008

Seconds @ Edin Uni Studs (Thu, Feb 14, '08)

The students we're pretty hot ...at least the ones I saw playing before having to be called in to work just as my own match completed.

Doug Browne at No 2: Played well but was always under the hammer from a very skilled and quick opponent. Quite a few points per game but the opponent always had another gear in store. 0-3.
Pete Cockburn at No 3: Poor sod had no chance at all against a very good player. The casual observer of a few rallies at a time would have seen a quite even-looking contest and would have been very surprised to be told it was 0-9, 0-9 to start with. The third game was once again very well contested but a sole point was the only reward. Nothing at all wrong with Pete's play....just totally outclassed by a good'un.
Mark Dutton at No 5: Consolidated the recent return to winning form with a very solid win against another very good young, fit opponent. Hard fought first game taken 10-9 but then against any casual observer's expectation it was the student who wilted and Mark ran out 9-2, 9-0 for a 3-0 win.
Kevin Roberts at No 1: .....didn't see any of it....think he lost the first game..
Iain Sinclair at No 4: Iain was unluck to lose the first game. An unfortunately missed double bounce would have given it to him. .....didn;t see any more...

We were playing next to the new gym facility they've built for the students.
...never seen so many sweating and scantily clad young ladies in one place at one time before... t'was also the general concensus of opinion from the other chaps. (seems to concur with Richard's comments)

Tuesday 12 February 2008

Firsts home v Dalgety Bay 2 (Tues 12.02.08)

An awesome performance tonight.

Stokesy took out the young Scott Drummond 3-0.
Man of the match, Gerald, demolished Colin Boswell, 27-5.
Al kept Alan Jones at bay, 27-4.
Chris won 3-0 against Gerry Gemmel with fast pace.
Mike went up 9-2, 9-2 against Gerry Burton, but took his foot of the gas 3-9, 2-9. Then applied the Perring formula to bag the all important 20th point, 3-2.

Overall 5-0, 20-2 on points.

Gerald subcontracted the cooking to Franco.

Man of the match: Gerald. An impressive result against Colin Boswell - a tough opponent who will run and run, given the chance. In past meetings with Grange, he's won most of them and taken a game of Alan Hamer!

Monday 11 February 2008

Highlights of 5th Minileague

Yet another fantastic month with a new record of 99 games played! Allowing for injuries and dropouts, this represents 86% of possible games played! Well done to leagues 1, 4, and 8 for playing all of your games and leagues 5 and 9 for managing all but 1 game. It was also good to see a very active league 13 this month.

A few leagues were affected by injuries this month, which can't be helped. For next season I've been wondering whether it might be better to have leagues of 6 rather than 5 and give an extra week to play games? This might reduce the impact of holidays etc and give more chance of games being played. Any views on the merits or otherwise of this would be most welcome.

The results of the fifth league are here ..... Jan/Feb league

A number of players managed four straight wins this month - Allan Hamer (once again!), David Grieve, Nick Ford, Robin Pollok and Jamie Halcro-Johnstone. Difficult to pick out a winner of "Minileaguer of the month" this time - I'll pick Allan for getting all games played in less than a week before heading off to work in Abu Dhabi! Other close contenders would be Nick for his relentless rise up the leagues, or either Robin or David for spectacular returns from injury! Also good to see Grange legends Ian Sinclair and Ian Mitchell back in the leagues and both securing promotion - competitive instincts undiminished!

Looking at all the results so far, Allan Hamer has jumped into the lead with 127 points scored, Fiona McLaren is second with 118 and Mike Moyes third with 115. Mike and Fiona also top the games played table with 21 and 20 respectively. We have 49 players who have managed to play 75% or more of the possible games. Keep it up.

Here is the new league ..... Feb/Mar league

Welcome to 4 new players this month - Kate Fry, Tim Ferguson (aged 14) and new members Nick Gray and Ralph Benson. For your benefit the rules are posted on the notice board next to the leagues.

Enjoy your games!

Dougie Brown

Friday 8 February 2008

Seconds home v Colinton Muscles (Thurs Feb 7,08)

At #4, Mark Dutton went one down to John Hamilton, levelled it 9-7 but then John took command, played some real early ball and won the next 2 without Mark doing anything particularly loose.
At #3, Peter Cockburn was on the warm court with Derek Wilson, it went point-for-point, game-for-game and Peter was the last man standing to take it 3-2, 9-7 in the fifth.
At #5, Ian Sinclair was on the cooler court but Hamish Williamson battled back from a fast Sinclair start before Ian tightened up to take the last two; 3-1.


Gerald Suggett at #2 against Tricky Ricky Easton had a very intense match, Gerald gave the guy as good a test as I've seen anyone at Grange do and won the first, keenly contested the other three but Ricky was playing deft drops from the back and unreadable drives from the front; 1-3.


The bonus points were up for grabs and Christy got the first game but turned petulant and got out-retrieved and out-shot by Colin Grant to lose 1-3.

Overall 2-3, 9-16 on points. A keenly contested tie with some good chat over pizzas afterwards with the opposition. Next week sees us visit The Pleasance on Thurs 7pm in a change to the advertised program.

Wednesday 6 February 2008

Firsts away v Abercorn 1 (Wed 06.02.08)

Some crafty players at Abercorn, but we did well.

Dougie beat Craig Sandilands 3-1.
Alan got the miles out of Tom Neil 3-1.
Al lost the first to Alastair MacKenzie, then pulled back to 3-1.
Mike had volley drops galore from super-wiley Ian Ross, but outpaced him 3-1. (We need to work out a game-plan for these old guys - we have Watsonians' Jim Dougal in 2 weeks).
Chris took the 3rd off old timer Eric Duncan, but lost 1-3.

Overall 4-1, 18-9 on points.

We refuelled on excellent chilli cooked by Ian Ross.

Man of the match: Stokesy for model behaviour.

Keep an eye on www.essasquash.co.uk/Oa3.txt for Colinton's position. 12 points ahead at last count, we have scored 20 and 18 since and have 4 games to go.

Friday 1 February 2008

Firsts away v Deer Park 2 (Thurs 31.01.08)

With leaders Colinton losing for the first time last week against Dalgety Bay, there are now only 12 points between us and 6 matches remaining. The contest for 1st place is back on!

It's cold courts at Deer Park. Talent Hamer and Mair were out of action, and whilst 4 of us were making our mental rehearsals, Perring sat in snow drifts for half the day. This one was not going to be easy. Half the tubes were blown on one court so it was like playing in a cave.

Dougie played Mark, Deer Park 3's T-dominating unbeaten no.1, in a close match, but Dougie's consistency and touch won through 3-1.
Christy won against Malcolm Lochrie 3-1.
Gerald and Sandra's match took place in the coldest and darkest room in the building. Gerald's fat reserves did not serve him so well against the cold but his night vision proved superior 3-0.
Al took a cold dip next and plunged into darkness with John Miller. It was looking bad at 1 game and 4-8 down in the 2nd, but Al defied 5 game balls and finished 3-1.
Mike was cruising against Milan Govan and won 3-1. (apart from playing the first like he was still stuck in the car behind a snow plow and getting grannied).

Overall 5-0, 20-6 on points. Colinton, we're coming to get you!

We tucked into soup, sarnies and soft drinks in the bar.

Man of the match: vote this week for Ali G's comeback, Gerald's night vision, or Dougie's tough win. Christy says Ali G!

Seconds Home vs BOS 31-01-2008

At No 2 Alan Stokes took on Robin Nisbet. The first two games were very level in terms of chances. The third 0-9 game was just one of those freak things where Robin simply got every break and Stokesy got none. He also was pretty drained by a long and tough second game plus having to play all the games on the weekend before.

Mark Dutton's game at No 3 was quite a good one against Rob Norris. Mark gave Rob a very hard time in the first two games and looked like he'd take it comfortably. However, Rob returned teh favour and gave Mark a hard time in the next two. The 2-9 in the last game wasn't a good reflection of how hard fought it was. Tons of handouts with Rob just gradually creeping away with the scraps of a point after each set of handouts.

Pete Cockburn played very well at the thankless No1 spot against Ralph Bain. Had a real shot at taking the third game but Ralph had just a teensy extra gear to go to to save the day for himself.

Steve Davey at No5 was just a few points adrift of the pace in games 1 and 2 against Bruce Melvin. He should have had the third in the bag and went to 8-8 but was done in the end.

Iain Sinclair made a comeback to the team at No4 against Aussie Mark Tucker. He played very well and won 3-1 and Mark Tucker's mangled racquet in the bin afterwards was an eloquent enough commentary on the game.

Loss 5-16.