NewsTeam 3 away at Haddington 3

November 27, 2022by admin

I’m not sure how Team 4 are getting on in Haddington tonight, but this is what happened to Team 3, at Haddington 3, a week ago. I must say that we were lucky to have George (and his car!), who usually can’t make Tuesdays, but managed to reschedule things so that he could play. George and Ken managed to find different ways to each lose in five ends in the first two matches, before star man Shashi showed then how to do it with a four-end win over young David Hayman,Ken then lost to Gordon, so the hosts were 3-1 up. Nobody knew then that that would be the hosts’ last match win of the night!

Shahi beat Mark in four, and George beat David in three, so the overall score was 3-3 just before the doubles. George and Shashi were two ends to one up, and they had a big lead in the fourth end. Which they tried very hard to lose, but managed to sneak out 13-15 in the fourth end. Oh, during the doubles Shashi hit two extremely hard forehand smashes that drew gasps from the three other players and the umpire.

So we were now 4-3 up, with still all three results possible. An oddity of the match schedule was that the three remaining singles matches featured two players who had won both their singles matches so far, two players who had each won one, lost one and two players who had lost both their singles matches so far. And Edinburgh International won all three remaining matches, though it was obviously very close in match 8, between Gordon and Shashi. George, apart from the first end, was too predarory for Mark in match 10, and Ken listened to George who had said that he could beat David in match 9. Unlike the visit to Penicuik III a fortnight ago, where George and Shashi won two matches each but we lost, this time Ken was glad to contribute. This is the team’s first proper victory (last week against North Merchiston IV doesn’t really count because they had only two players.). By the way, there is a rumour that Shahi wants to transfer to Haddington, because every time he plays at Haddington, he wins his three (Shashi had won his three when we played Haddington 4 three weeks ago)!

Following Team 1’s rousing 8-2 win over Edinburgh Sports Club 1 the previous day, this win by Team 3 meant that the club played two, won two fixtures last week. Could we make it four out of four? Alas no, on Wednesday we as a club had three things against us: the lights being less than adequate, Team 2 having only two players and then Team 4 missing Mike who had been taken to hospital (happily, now back home). So these three handicaps resulted in two very tough fixtures for Team 2 hosting North Merchiston II and for Team 4 hosting West Lothian V. Yet, that still leaves the club at 50% for the week, so not too bad overall ….

Here’s the scorecard for Team 3 away at Haddington 3: