Nothing Fawlty With Manuel's Challenge For Over 50's Title

Malcolm Manuel reached the final of the Over 50's Singles for the second year running after producing some faultless table tennis. He swept aside Jim Westwood in his first match winning in straight sets and in the quarter final his opponent Stuart Element fared no better as he was also beaten in straight sets. Manuel's semi-final match was against Helmuth Osborne and in a close and often fiery contest Manuel eventually overcame his opponent 13-11, 11-9, 9-11, 11-9 to make it through to the final where he will meet Mick Brooks. Brooks made it through to the final with a 3-0 win over Chris Clemson and then followed that up with a narrow 3-2 win against Peter Eyre before knocking out last year's winner Steve Lyon 3-1 in the semi-final.
In the Over 60's Singles Steve Lyon went one better than in the Over 50's as he reached the final of a competition that he's won for the last three years. Lyon enjoyed a bye in the second round before beating Alan Wilson 3-1 with Wilson playing some great table tennis on the night. Lyon then eased past Ken Alvey in straight sets in his semi-final. In the other half of the draw Peter Eyre was the player that had hit top form with straight sets wins all the way to the final. Chris Clemson, Jim Westwood and Stuart Element all fell victim to Eyre after he produced some solid play to which they could find no answer to.
This week also saw the Mike Tunningley Handicap Shield reach the quarter final stage with some intriguing match ups in prospect. Ryton Park Falcons may be at the wrong end of the Division Three table but they are enjoying a fabulous run in the cup competitions having already made it through to the semi-final of the MBE Trophy and they made it two semi-finals with a 390 to 378 points victory over Manton Sports of Division Two. Despite not managing to win a any of the 9 matches on the night the Falcons trio of Jordan Potter, Lee Banton and Justin Flear all made telling points contributions amassing 190 points to the Sports 378 and when the sealed envelope was opened to reveal the handicap points the Falcons were awarded 200 to give them victory by just 12 points.
Another side that are enjoying good cup runs this season are DTH Redlands Monsters and they continued their good cup form with a solid win over fellow Division Two side Stanley Street 'B'. For the Monsters Orestas, Valentinas and Martynas Riauba racked up 360 points on the table out of the maximum 378 obtainable with only Jack Kirkland managing to stop them achieving maximum points after he defeated Martynas 21-10 and 21-14. The Street side managed to score 248 points of their own but when they added the 90 handicap points they were awarded to their total it wasn't enough to stop them slipping to a 360-338 defeat.
The only other quarter final result in saw DTH Redlands Rookies brush aside their club colleagues DTH Redlands Joggers with a convincing display. For X-Youth Jeff Reay beat all three Joggers Matthew Mudd, Kyle McIntosh and Dennis Learad and when both Clive Eden and Ewan Pickersgill also beat Mudd and McIntosh the writing was on the wall for the Joggers. Despite Learad enjoying success against Eden and Pickersgill the X-Youth side had done enough on the night with the handicappers deciding that no points would be awarded to either side which meant X-Youth winning by the scoreline of 350-288.
Whilst the week was designated to the Mike Tunningley Shield some teams took advantage of the break in league matches to catch up on previously cancelled games. One such side was Manton Nomads who were up against fellow Division One strugglers Stanley Street 'A' and with neither side able to field their strongest team and vital points on offer in the relegation dogfight an intriguing mach was in prospect. For the Nomads both Kartik Lakhani and Rob Vaughan remained unbeaten on the night, both managing to beat all three Street players in Peter Eyre, Jack Kirkland and Matt 'Lefty' Williams to register hat tricks. The Street's only successes came when Eyre beat the Nomad's Ian Henderson and also when Eyre and Kirkland beat Henderson and Vaughan in a 5 set doubles but it wasn't enough to stop the Nomads running out 8-2 winners. The result moves the Nomads up into 4th place in the table and 12 points above the relegation places with Stanley Street 'A' still sitting a precarious 5 points away from the drop zone.
Division Three champions elect DTH Redlands Rookies continued their seemingly unstoppable march to the title with yet another league win and now only need to win 3 of their last 6 games to clinch the title. The Rookies recorded their 12th straight league victory by hammering DTH Redlands Liver Birds 10-0 and have now only dropped an incredible 11 individual games all season! Although the Rookies whitewashed the Liver Birds there were some tight matches with Paul Jordan taking Chris Clemson to a deciding set and son Elliot running Bob Atkinson close but they were always going to be up against it and the Rookies side of Chris Cutts, Clemson and Atkinson all remained unbeaten with Cutts and Atkinson taking the doubles.
Other Division Three Result: On-Line Elks 9 Stanley Street 'E' 1
Division Two Result: Manton Tigers 10 Manton Sports 0