Soaked tennis season’s smashing doubles finale
Hat-trick of wins for all round sportsman
CAMPBELTOWN’S anoraked aces braved the tail end of a hurricane to blast balls across the net in an October end to the tennis season.
Four months since the game received its annual Wimbledon lift and just before the clocks go back an hour, five players contested the much postponed men’s doubles last Sunday.
For one postgraduate law student, Thomas Jordan, the trip back from Glasgow gave him a hat-trick of successes this season.
With such a small number of players and one key player determined to watch the Rangers v Motherwell match in the afternoon, it was inevitable the championship would be swift. All five names were put in a hat. Hector McMurchy and Sary Rahma were drawn to play Donald MacKay and Thomas Jordan in a one set quickfire preliminary round.
Mark Davey, who has not won a single league match all season despite some close games, gained a bye. He played his first tennis final ever with one of the losing pairs in the qualifier. In that set, Rahma and McMurchy struggled to get into the match and lost the first three games. Despite some scintillating serves from the big hitting Jordan, he left the door open on a number of occasions with double faults.
Rahma nursed a sore shoulder and groin strain. It was a competitive pairing and McMurchy, who hates to lose, helped force three deuces in the seventh game, while 5-1 down, but the duo crashed out.
McMurchy crossed his fingers not to get picked for the final, which was to be played across three sets and that dubious honour fell to Rahma.
In the first set Rahma and Davey led for a while, at 3-2, after some thrilling rallies. These included lobs in a comedy of deciding who should chase the ball, but it was not to be, Davey took a heavy backwards fall and Rahma’s injuries began to tell.
Despite MacKay’s many double faults he more than made up for them with lovely passing shots down the opposing backhand line. Combined with Jordan’s thumping serves the duo romped home to finish the second set 6-2.
This season’s winners were: Wright Ogilvie shield (U12s): Logan Lovell, Junior champion: Alasdair Ferguson, Junior league shield: Alasdair Ferguson, HMS Platypus cup for mixed doubles: Jamie Morris and Jane Gallagher, Dickson trophy men’s singles: Thomas Jordan, Men’s singles league: Thomas Jordan, Women’s singles was not played, Women’s doubles: Jane Gallagher and Anne Ogilvie, CGS girls: Susan Shaw, CGS junior boys: Scott Graham, CGS senior boys: Millar Irwin.