Prestbury fly the flag for town’s teams
THE first set of fixtures following the North West Counties League’s festive mid-seasonal break involved (as the final pre-Christmas one of three weeks earlier had done) only those divisions containing larger numbers of men’s teams.
Consequently, Fifth Division South sides – including five from clubs in and around our town - were once again in action last Thursday.
And, as things turned out, each match involving local teams ended with the same result as the corresponding reverse-fixture from earlier in the season.
That, sadly from a parochial viewpoint, meant just the one victory on the night, with Prestbury’s Fifth Team - who had also been sole winners among the local Division Five quintet three weeks previously - triumphing 4-1 at home to Grove Park 7.
Ben Parker, Gareth Evans and Dave Marwood helped to get the table-toppers’ new year off to a good start with straight-games victories, while Rhys Asquith-Evans celebrated his recent 14th birthday by beating a fellow junior player 3-1.
The win preserves their lead at the top… by a single point!
In continued hot pursuit of the ‘Fifths’ are unbeaten Alderley Edge 6, who kept up the pressure by hosting, and winning 5-0 against, Bollington 4.
The ninth-placed ‘Bolly Fourths’ were unable, despite best efforts, to do their Prestbury nearneighbours a favour – with each visiting player falling in straight games.
Prestbury 6, one position above Bollington, fared little better as the ‘away’ side – albeit while playing at Bollin Grove against hosts, and Prestbury tenants, Radbroke Hall 3.
Having established a sequence of alternate victories and defeats that went back as far as mid-November, the ‘Sixths’, by virtue of that, were due a win! Instead, alas, they suffered a 5-0 reverse - although captain Pat Hunter, junior player Rory Hughes (16) and returning student, 18-year-old Greg Stanger, each picked up a game to boost their team’s pointstally.
Macclesfield 2 came closest to joining Prestbury 5 in the winners’ enclosure, when entertaining third-placed Crewe Vagrants 6 at the town’s leisure centre.
Russell Stagg and Bader Khan both triumphed in straight games, while captain Simon Fisher pushed his visiting Vagrant opponent all the way over five games – only to be edged out 3-2, as, too, his team ultimately was, resulting in a drop of one place to 11th for Macc.
Finally, Prestbury 7 - still looking for a first win of the campaign - fielded four juniors at home to in-form Alderley Edge 7.
One of them - 16-year-old Harry Mattocks - did well to take a game off the player at the top of the divisional rankings, but the visitors, who arrived on the back of five straight victories, eventually prevailed 5-0.
The inaugural full schedule of men’s team matches for 2018 will go ahead tomorrow - three days following the resumption of the Cheshire Ladies’ League.
Reports on all the action will appear in this column next week.