In the top tier, Kingfisher A continued their winning ways, stamping their authority on the league, by breezing past Tidmarsh A 10-0.
Kingfisher’s Hari Gehlot and Ross Saxby comfortably achieved their maximums. Tidmarsh’s captain Duncan Groves came close to causing a major upset as he found himself 2-1 up in sets and 5-2 up in points against Martin Adams, but could not convert his advantage, eventually succumbing 11-9 7-11 11-9 6-11 4-11.
Elsewhere, Kingfisher B lost comprehensively 1-9 to Kingfisher D, whose captain Julian Telford suffered a major calf injury during the match.
He soldiered on to record two wins, narrowly losing out to Phil Mead. Julian’s colleagues Graham Mendick and Ryan Cheung scored three wins each and the doubles to complete the win.
Tilehurst RBL A were elevated to a mid-table position as they completed a 9-1 victory over Kingfisher C, despite some closely fought rubbers. Keith Winter’s and Marc Brent’s maximums, competently backed up by Jon Willis’ defensive skills proved too strong on this occasion.
Despite Paul Savage winning the opening encounter with Jason Roberts to give the home side, Sonning Sports A, early hope, the battle for Sonning supremacy was won by Sonning Common & Peppard A 9-1. Jamie Barlow and Neil Hurford winning three each plus the doubles.
In division 2 Sonning Common & Peppard C won a hard fought tussle with Kingfisher F 7-3, Nigel Maltby, Malcolm Gregory and Brian Meheux each winning twice with Malcolm just holding off Eapen John to win 13-11 in the fifth and Brian gaining a good 11-7 11-6 11-5 win over Ajai Hamaman. In the Kingfisher derby the G and E teams drew 5-5.
Clive Gold got a very good maximum for the E team including recovering form 2-1 down to beat Abhay Gore 11-9 in the fifth.
Abhay and Akeel Mir both won twice for the G team. Nigel just held off Roger Pritchard in the final set of the night thanks to two lucky netcords at the end to win 11-7 11-4 8-11 4-11 11-7.
Our Lady of Peace C won a hard fought match against Sonning Common & Peppard D 7-3 with all of their players recording two wins. The highlight of the night was SC&P’s Mark Jones recovering from losing the first two games to beat Sanket Dave 7-11 4-11 13-11 11-4 11-7 on his way to a maximum.
Our Lady of Peace B beat Tilehurst Methodists A 7-3 in a match which was mired by an injury to Tilehurst’s Jes Eassom. Eric Van Looy got a maximum for Tilehurst but was pushed hard in his sets against Darek Kaminski and Dave Godfrey, winning both in five.
Division 3 had four interesting games, two finished with a 5-5 draw, whereas the other 2 games were one-sided victories. Despite Tilehurst Methodists B won by a margin of 8-2 against Sonning Sports B, all the five set matches were a deciding factor in this match with seven out of 10 games finished 3-2, and Sonning Sports B winning only one of these games. Himanshu Pasbola’s all three matches finished 3-2, and he won one of them while the other win singles win from Sonning Sports B was from Harry Brough.
The highlight of the match was a great comeback from Michael Williams in the final match, and this also won him the Player of the Match award. In the OLOP derby between Our Lady of Peace E and Our Lady of Peace Fit was the E team who triumphed 9-1.
Maximums from Parvin Baishkiyar and Louise Forster helped the E team to an easy win. Unfortunately Alice Walker had to concede her last two matches for the F team while Alona Slobodskoy once again had their only win as she beat Harry Bullock 11-13 11-4 11-7 11-7. After the match Parvin maintained his 100% record.
After winning at Tidmarsh D last week, Kingfisher H took on Tidmarsh C this time and the Kingfisher team battled to a second 5-5 draw of the season.
The highlight of the match was the exciting doubles match where Kingfisher H won the 5th set from 9-5 down 11-9. Another exciting match was between Springfield A and Pangbourne WMC. Both teams are the strongest candidates for the title thus, this match was very important for both teams.
Another interesting fact is that three players (Jason King, Clive Taylor and John Simmonds) had a 100% average until this game.
Unsurprisingly the match ended 5-5. Only Clive Taylor remained at his 100% average after the game and also became the Player of the Match. Jason King lost one match, whereas John Simmonds lost his last 2 games 3-2. The highlight of the match was Pangbourne’s comeback in the doubles from 0-2 down to a 3-2 win.
Tilehurst RBL C maintained their winning start in division 4 by getting home at Kingfisher J 7-3 with Linda King, Jim Brent and Paul Treadgold all gaining doubles. Sinning Common & Peppard E won 8-2 at Springfield B with Anthony Reeve and Jim Warren both gaining three straight trebles, while club mates Sonning Common & Peppard F beat Sonning Sports C 6-4 with Gerry Bacon starting with a very good maximum and Graeme Streets winning twice on his return to league table tennis.
By Nigel Maltby
