Wrest Park lost to Surbiton 3-4

[<<] [>>] by Andy Dibben at Wrest Park
15 Jul 2018 (AC - Mary Rose)

Surbiton beat Wrest Park 4:3 - Report by Andy Dibben

In a very close match 3:3 with the 7th game tied when time was called, Surbiton managed to scrape home with a 4:3 win. David Morgans, who was in play when time was called was unable to make 1 further hoop and Ed Dymock managed to just hit in and peg out his Rover ball to win the 7th game, and the match +1 on time.

Like everywhere else at the moment the lawns at Wrest Park were very fast which made it difficult to get breaks going and for close hoop approaches.

The match started promptly at 10:00 (The M25 and M1 both behaving themselves for once facilitating a timely arrival by the Surbiton players).

When lunch was ready at 13:00 none of the morning games had finished. The doubles match finished first at around 14:30 and the 2 lower handicap afternoon singles started but the second morning singles match did not finish until after 16:00. With the match standing at 2:1 to Surbiton it was therefore decided to impose a 20:00 finish time on all the afternoon games.

The game between Andy & Cliff was first to finish giving Surbiton a 3:1 lead. Graham was on the verge of winning the game against George - and the match for Surbiton - when a short roquet at penult meandered off target. George capitalised on this and went on to win the game. Mary then lost to John - leaving the match tied at 3:3, the last game being very close with 30 minutes of time remaining. Both Ed and John had several break opportunities in the last 30 minutes but failed to make significant numbers of hoops. With time running out Ed was on peg and hoop 5 with David 1 hoop behind on 2 back and penult. David got the innings and levelled the game by running 2 back as time was called. However he failed to make 3 back and left all 4 balls separated. This left Ed with the choice of joining up by playing his backward ball or (so Ed claimed) shooting with his peg ball at a double of peg and oppo ball. He chose the later and just managed to nick the edge of the opponents ball thus able to peg the ball out and win the game +1 T.

A very enjoyable day and our thanks to Bryan Harral - The Wrest Park non playing captain - who provided an excellent lunch and had to watch the game for 10 hours as he had made himself ineligible to play by getting his handicap down to -0.5.

Results, Surbiton names first:

Andy Dibben and Graham Brightwell beat Cliff Jones and George Collin +9
Mary Knapp beat David Morgans +7
Ed Dymock lost to John Bevington -10

Andy Dibben beat Cliff Jones +12
Graham Brightwell lost to George Collin -4
Mary Knapp lost to John Bevington -14
Ed Dymock beat David Morgans +1T