Hawks Prey On Blue Jays To Go Joint Second

Sparken Hill Hawks continued their good to their Division Three league campaign with an 8-2 win over Sparken Hill Blue Jays who were considered one of the favourites for promotion before the start of the season. Bothe Lewis Linacre and Paul Wendon returned comfortable looking hat tricks over Ivan Stallworthy, Dave Lee and John McIntyre with Tom Wendon adding two wins after beating Lee and McIntyre. Stallworthy managed to avoid his side losing all the singles games when he managed to overcome Tom Wendon in 4 very close games. The Blue Jays did manage to add another win to their total as Cath McIntyre and Stallworthy came together to beat Linacre and Tom Wendon in straight sets.
The win puts the Hawks level on points with DTH Redlands Rovers who were involved in a top of the table clash with DTH Redlands Rookies who had a 100% record in the league and were in no mood to relinquish that record as they recorded an impressive 8-2 win and at the half way point in the league season look like they will walk away with the Division Three title as they are now 5 points clear at the top. Against the Rovers it was Bob Atkinson and Derek Piper that did most of the damage as they beat all three Rovers players in Adam Pinches, Roman Rosser and Keith Bloomfield with Bloomfield managing to beat Gary Robinson to record the Rovers only singles win of the night. Pinches and Rosser took the doubles in straight sets against Atkinson and Robinson.
DTH Redlands Mean Machine continue to improve as the season unfolds and despite losing 7-3 to DTH Redlands Tarr Babies put in a good performance. The Tarr Babies Ethan Shevill and Anna Mocan both played well to record hat tricks which set their team up for a well-deserved victory. Although the Tarr Babies Stefan Mocan fought hard he couldn’t manage to bag a singles win of his own losing out to Daisy Walshaw, Grace Dickenson and Joseph Wootton for the Rovers. The doubles game looked like a real tussle as Shevill and Anna Mocan came from 2-1 down to beat Walshaw and Dickenson 3-2 to complete the 7-3 scoreline.
The winners of Division Two looks like a forgone conclusion as Worksop Welfare Snipers ‘B’ won their tenth consecutive league game. Despite not having their best player available the Snipers overcame Manton Sports by the scoreline of 9-1 but that could have been very different if Sports had elected to put their best team out. Stanley Street ‘B’ took full advantage of the Sports loss as they leapfrogged then into second place with an impressive 8-2 win over Manton Tigers. At the other end of the table Sparken Hill Falcons did their chances of staying up no harm as they managed to beat Worksop Welfare Harriers 6-4 helped by a Luke Barraclough hat trick.
Division One side Worksop Miners Welfare put themselves right back in the hunt for the Division One title with two away wins in two nights. In their first match they beat DTH Redlands Roosters 7-3 which included a Richard Element hat trick and the night after they then just managed to overcome Clowne ‘A’ by a narrow 6-4 margin despite John Davies of Clowne ‘A’ returning a very impressive hat trick. The wins now put the Welfare side one point behind DTH Redlands Fluffy Toys and three behind DTH Redlands Monsters.
The Fluffy Toys were involved in a real ding dong of a match at home to Stanley Street ‘A’ which ended in a 5-5 draw with Sarah Short of the Fluffy Toys taking the accolade of being Player Of The Match with an impressive looking hat trick of singles wins.
The current league leaders are DTH Redlands Monsters and they continued their push for the title with what looked like a comfortable 9-1 win against Worksop Welfare Snipers ‘A’ but with four of the games going to a deciding set it was anything but comfortable and they could have easily come away with only a draw.
At the bottom end of the table Sparken Hill Starlings eased their relegation worries with an 8-2 win over bottom side Clowne ‘B’ but again the match was much closer than the scoreline suggested.