Eyre Furnishes His Front Room With Hard Bat Trophy

After losing in the final for the last three years Peter Eyre finally got his name back on the trophy that he last won back in the 2010/11 season and has now featured in eight finals of the Hard Bat Trophy. Eyre featured in Group B in the first round of the competition and comfortably dispatched Adam Hamilton 21-5, Clive Eden 21-13, Connor Bettley 21-13 and Luke Barraclough 21-8 to top his group to make it into the semi finals with Clive Eden also making it through as Group runner-up.
In Group A Jeff Reay and Mark Bloomer showed the rest a clean pair of heels as they both qualified for the semi finals with 63 and 62 points respectively with Tom Parker and Matthew Williams languishing in 3rd and 4th spots.
In the semi finals Eyre took no time at all in dispatching a spirited Mark Bloomer 21-9 with Jeff Reay enjoying his 4th consecutive win of the night beating his club team mate Clive Eden 21-14 to set up a tasty looking final with Eyre.
The final was played up to 31 points with Eyre taking an early lead which he managed to maintain throughout the match despite Reay's best efforts winning it 31-23 to once more take the Hard Bat title.
Clive Eden beat Mark Bloomer 21-11 in the 3rd and 4th place play off final.
The Mike Tunningley Shield reached the quarter final stage this week with some excellent matches none more so than the match between Ryton Park Adders and Ryton Park Falcons. Adders from Division One knew that their opponents from Division Three were going to be given a large handicap at the end of the night so they knew they couldn't afford to drop many points in all of their games. They were fairly certain that they would win all of their games against the Falcons who are two divisions below them so not conceding many points was critical if they were to make it through to the semi finals. Ivan Guilliatt led the way for the Adders only dropping 20 points with Andy Lee not far behind him in dropping 26 but with Gary Sides dropping 40 points against the Falcons trio of Jordan Potter, Mick Potter and Jak Eden it was always going to be touch and go as to whether it was going to be enough once the handicap points were added at the end. The Adders won the match on the table 378-86 and after the sealed envelope was opened it revealed that the Falcons had been given 290 handicap points which after being added to their points scored meant that the Adders had won by just two points, 378-376.
Two first division sides did battle to try to make it through to the semi finals as DTH Redlands Joggers met DTH Redlands Roosters in a good contest with the less experienced Joggers team putting in a good performance with good wins for Lea Dickinson against Dave Gascoyne and Matthew Mudd just losing out to Rick Harris by a point. There was also some good contributions from Lewis Comely who despite losing all his three games returned some valuable points for the Joggers, especially in his match with Steve Fox. Despite their efforts the Joggers couldn't do enough and lost 357-252 on the table and even with 50 handicap points being awarded to them they went down by 357-352.
Two First Division sides had already made it into the semi finals but there wasn't going to be a third as Division Three On-Line Elks put in the performance of the round beating Stanley Street 'A' 457-378. The Elks team of Jonno Blood, Neil Houghton and Glen Gillgrass played really well to amass 197 points on the table against their more illustrious opponents in Matthew Williams, Kyle McIntosh and Peter Eyre who despite winning every game couldn't keep the Elks teams score to a lower enough level to nullify the handicap points that inevitably were going to be awarded to the Elks. Street 'A' managed to win the match on the table by 378-197 but after the Elks were awarded 260handicap points they lost the match overall by 457-378.
The fourth quarter final between DTH Redlands Tarr Babies and Stanley Street Cypriots was awarded to the Cypriots.
Division One Result: Manton Misfits 3 MBE 7
Division Two Result: Ryton Park Cougars 0 Manton Sports 10
Division Three Results: Ryton Park Dragons 3 Ryton Park Falcons 7
Reg Wilcox Trophy Result: Manton Nomads 468 DTH Redlands Rookies 455