Hockley A handed out an 8-1 thrashing to Basildon B to leave themselves top of Division 1 at this early stage of the season in the Southend Summer League. Basildon actually started the match by winning the first doubles but it was downhill after that as Hockley won all the remaining games. Credit, though, to Peter Hilton who took Tarun Goel and Tim Pang to five sets but just couldn’t manage the crucial fifth. Joseph Odegbami made up the Hockley team winning both his singles without dropping a set and winning both his doubles also to make him an easy choice as player of the match. Jenne Seibolt and Dawn Baldry completed the Basildon team.
Sitting just one point behind Hockley are the Basildon A team who chalked up their third win by beating the highly rated and pre-season favourites Rawreth 6-3. Les Hoey was their star performer on the night winning all his singles and doubles closely followed by Ian Wall who also won both his singles and his doubles with Hoey. Rob Burton completed the team but he found it hard going on the night losing his singles to Kim Shead and Norbert Fullerton. Fullerton was actually two sets down against Burton but edged it 11/8 in the deciding set. Shead and Russell Mills combined to win the final doubles.
Creeping up into third place with two wins from two games are Matchpoint A who came back from 3-0 and 4-3 down against Hockley B to win the final doubles and clinch a 5-4 victory. This condemned Hockley to a third successive defeat. The evening had started so well for Hockley winning the opening doubles and then good wins for Paul Ogden against Dan Stewart and Stuart Adshead against Samuel Morgan. Matchpoint then took their turn to win two singles and a doubles Hannah Harbour and Stewart both defeating Paul Strutt in four sets and then Stewart and Morgan combining to win the doubles. Harbour carried an unbeaten record from the winter league into this match but after winning the first set against Adshead he ground out a four set victory winning the fourth 14/12. Young Samuel Morgan then took centre stage and showed just how much he is improving as a player beating Ogden in straight sets to level the scores at 4-4. The final doubles between Strutt and Ogden and Stewart and Morgan lived up to expectations going all the way to five sets before Matchpoint sealed the win 7/11 11/7 16/14 9/11 6/11.
Hadleigh A picked up their first win of the season in fine style beating Wakering 8-1 and condemning them to a third straight defeat. Michael Grout got the consolation point for Wakering beating Anthon Ranjit-Singh and Martin Shaughnessy almost added another as he lost in five sets to Simon Jacob but otherwise Hadleigh were very much in command. Keith Willett took the POTM award and also demonstrated a new trick shot, playing the ball from behind his back while facing away from the table and still winning the point! Not surprisingly he gets my vote for Player of the Week!
Team of the Week – Basildon A
Player of the Week – Keith Willett
Report by Paul Strutt