Racketball @ ESC on Wed Aug 29

Ian Green made his debut, suckered into playing #1 against Ross McHoul. It was 15-6 in the first two, then Ian started to get the hang of it and while Ross ran on to a 3-0 win, Ian had put him under some pressure and cut out him doing showboat shots.

Dave Grieve at #4 against Irvine, looked like he was going to have the final say in all the rallies early doors, but it did not turn out so. Irvine was full of movement and ground it out 3-0.

Rob Henry at #5 against Captain Croan, this game had everything, John doing behind-the-back and through the legs winners while Rob was rolling his wrist for fun on some tremendous winners.

John did well to get away with a 3-1.

Jordan was a bit out of sorts against Les and I would say the same for Christy against Eric Hogg. I'm sure if we had those matches back again, we'd flatter ourselves to think we'd do things differently but there's no escaping we were well beaten.

Onto the main event, Chicken curry with somosas followed by seconds, followed by some sweet delicacies. Talk turned to racketlon and how Les taught Ross McHoul everything he knows about racketball, especially serving from the hand ;-)

Thanks to all who gave racketball a go this season and looking forward to a good season of squash now.

The Grange home to The Dean (Racketball 23/8/11)

Four against four on eact team. Dave Grieve played Chris at no. 2. chris was in squash mode which suited Dave as he kept the errors down while taking his chances at the front: 3-0.
Rob Henry made his debut against Michael and came back from losing the first game to win the next 3 convincingly.
At no. 3, Jordan faced James Birkhead who was banditing low down the order due to not having played much racketball. Jordan lost the first narrowly but levelled in the second. One rally was a tribute to The Matrix as James bend into a banana to avoid the slow-mo swish of Jordan's racket and then dived to retrieve and win the rally. James kept his Keanu Reeves persona by winning the next two games against the machines.
Christy faced Ron Todd and got control in the first two games just by blowing the blue ball about. Ron started to just pick him off from the back (or Christy tinned a lot) to level it. Christy built up a good lead in the fifth and almost ended up with egg on his face, much to the balcony's amusement, with some showboating corkscrew serves befere Ron mercifully tinned at game-ball down.
Chef Grieve served up some sumptuous chicken curry in giant portions with Naan bread. Just an away match to ESC and the club RB championships to decide, so a good point to include a summary of results so far:

Farewell to quite a few team players for the upcoming season

Rob Pfab -> Barcelona MBA bound. MBA stands for Master of Bugger All
Pat Langley-> Lahndan, now on the teams at Southgate SRC league 1
Tony Gribben: retired due to hip giving him gyp
Clive Allison -> returning to Yorkshire and Harrowgate SRC
Steve Eyles-> heading back to Milton Keynes
Jonathan Frame -> Australia
Robin Pollok -> snapped achilles

Best of luck everyone and thanks for all the support over the last year(s).
A good team's worth of players gone, though it is not all a bust as we have gained Nick Wood and hope to be announcing some major signings before the transfer window closes on Oct 1.

Racketball @ Colinton Castle (Aug 15,'11)

Messrs Sloan and Lyth fronted up for a spin on the magic carpet to the Castle. Nick immediately faced experienced racketer John Barry and took 2 games to settle into the rhythm of the game. After that, Nick started to lengthen the rallies and had game ball but lost out 15-17. Disappointed not to get a fourth game out of it.
Brian S at #2 against Mike Halpin was a humdinger played in a great spirit, with Brian edging it 3-2. Dave Grieve at #4 against Sandy Williamson seemed to be in control 2-0 but Sandy steadied ship and as it went to 5, Dave got more disconsolate and lost out. Christy polished off John Stohlner at #3 serving a lot of aces early doors and John seemed a bit rusty.
At #1, Mike Gore took his turn at #1 and after running up a few nervous errors in the first game with Rod Robinson, he came into his own in the second to run the score up to 8 points including one rolling nick serve. Roddy tightened the nut down in the third but a good show by Mike in his second match for the team.
Overall 2-3 and a derby clash with The Dean Club to look forward to. Pie and beans went down well. The ESSA committee were in session, discussing running a racketball league next season with Roddy & Ross Anderson representing the views of the 7 existing summer teams.

Racketeers at Waverley (Wed, Aug 10)

Six of us fronted up at Waverley and we were immediatelytrading matches as Jordan Fleming took a turn at sacrificial lamb #1 against Mike Read (playing not Baadly but still 0-3, he hee) while Dave Grieve had the measure of Brian Scott at #5 3-1.

Christy went on as a sand-bagger at #4 but was thwarted in his ploy as they had Ben who'd never played the game before but also turned out to be a bit of a sandbagger. A humonguous number of humonguously long rallies, nonetheless 0-3. Paul Dale at #6 lost the first 16-17 and pushed John Allan all the way: 0-3.

Gavin Fulton made his debut at #3 but suffered tinnitus against Bruce Ferguson: 0-3, the good news being that his achilles tonr 6 months ago seems to be ok so far.

We were all tucking into beers 'n food when Mike Gore got underway with Neil Kempsell. Mike refused to be caricatured while Neil refused to be Gored. Aroound 10:15, they emerged as two sweatbags, with Neil having won 15-13 in the fifth.

Bruce's wife conjured up chilli of the meat and the vegetarian kinds, pity the hulking carcase of Dean Wood wasn't there to enjoy it. I now look like Michelin man after two servings, so I can safely award 5 michelin stars for the chilli 'n garlic bread.

News for Dave Ferguson is that his beloved Jambos have completed a loan deal with Tottenham for their italian striker Grabatelli ;-)

Racketballers home v Hatton (Tue, Jul 27)

Brian Sloan at #1 took on Nick Tinning to make an early getaway and allow Mrs Sloan to make her 8pm netball game. Two down pretty quickly, Brian made a good comeback to take the third on extra points and looked to be about to mess up his wife's plans. However Nick lived up to his forename rather than his surname and took the fourth 15-9.

Paul Dale made his debut at #5 and was picking up the rules as he went along. Sean McMenamy gave him a good match and Paul was getting closer as it sent on, getting to 12 in the third game. A good account of himself considering he hadn't played before.

Ally Ross at #4 lost the first and the second went to extra points (also lost) and he died a bit in the third. Christy played Malcom Mitchell at #2 and had a few comedy moments scrummaging Malcolm out of the way but unfortunately no champagne moments.

Mike Douglas won the first game but by his own admission got bored and faded badly in the middle two games. He made a charge in the fourth and got to 13 but that was that.

Overall 2-15 which is much the same as we got out in Hatton.