Scare for champs in fighting draw
IN the penultimate week of the league programme, ‘Champions’ Princes St A travelled to Crosby A, and were given a scare in an exciting fighting draw.
Colin Turner and Michael Stewart between them accounted for all of those five points, whilst Crosby’s Elliott Cooper, with a hard working double, looked to have kept the hosts in it.
Argyle A got back to winning ways with a very good 3-7 away win at Crosby B, where apart from newly crowned ‘Singles Champion’ Charlie Williams, the ‘young guns’ did struggle against the experience of the visitors, particularly the fine full quota of wins from Michael McCormack.
Division 1 winners Princes St C rubber stamped their success with another maximum, this time at home to Crosby D. Well, that’s what the scorecard said, but considering the Crosby side pushed the ‘champs’ all the way in five of the contests, losing out in the fifth each time, then they deserve a lot of credit.
Unluckiest player of the night was the visitors number one Marcus
Doyle, who missed out in the fifth in all of his three contests, so close.
Having missed out on the top prize last week, Southport A took their disappointment out on Formby Village B winning a procession of points in a maximum home victory.
Maybe a ‘runners up’ spot will ease the pain, and that looked far more likely after rivals Formby Village A and Princes St B could well have cancelled each other out of the running in a very close affair which finished 4-6 to Princes St. Formby’s Barry Davis and the visitors Martyn Coleman were the standout performers on the night.
Division 2 leaders Princes St F, still look to hold all the aces, especially when they have a match or two in hand on their nearest rivals.
So, this week there was another crunch match for them against their D team who themselves are still in with a shout for at least a runners up spot.
A bitter blow greeted the leaders with news number one Genadijs Afanasjevs was out through injury, so Dave Noden took on his mantle and what a great start he made with a convincing three straight win over Chris Foley.
It was all square after two contests, Karen Gibson
just getting the better of Irene Mullan in four games, 11-6,11-4,1214,14-12, before first Darren Taylor and then Dave again, both secured the points in the fifth game against Ian Lunt and Colin Fyles respectively to make it 1-3 for the leaders.
If there were any thoughts that the D team would be rolling over, well they certainly quashed that theory as three quickfire victories from Karen, Ian and then Chris made the score 4-3 D team, game on!
This had become a superb match and when the doubles were then shared, making it 5-4, it was left to Darren to win the final encounter against Colin to tie it up at 5-5, What a great match and probably the right result.
Rainford took over as being the closest rivals to the leaders after an excellent away win at Waterloo B where a full quota of wins from both Nick Roberts and captain Paul Melling capped a great team performance against tough opponents.
Princes St F with two matches next week could well clinch the title, if not the rearranged match versus Rainford the week after would certainly decide it.
Crosby E just got the better of their match at home to Argyle D, with both Luke Govier and Louie Cooper providing the difference in a 6-4 success.
Division 3 leaders Southport C went a good way in their quest for securing the title after an excellent 1-9 victory away to Carlton.