Nottingham’s most prestigious Squash Club once again hosted this year’s Civil Service Team Squash Championships. All the main Departments were represented and overall the event attracted some 30 players from all parts of the country. The resultant line-up saw the six teams of three men and two ladies line-up into two groups of three teams playing in a ‘Round Robin’ format, with the top two teams from each group progressing to semi-final stages of the main Event.
In the first group defending champions DSRA (Defence) came top with excellent wins over RCSL (Revenue & Customs) and HASSRA ‘B’ teams. RCSL in turn grabbed the runners up spot with a fine 4-1 win over HASSRA ‘B’.
The second group saw SPARTA (Transport) emerge as overall winners although they were hard pressed by HASSRA ‘A’ who stretched them all the way with a 3-2 score-line! Land Registry struggled against both these teams and whilst not winning any of their matches they did show remarkable team spirit, sportsmanship and effort and certainly won over plenty of friends!
The first of the semi-finals saw Defence play HASSRA ‘A’ – a repeat of last year’s finely balanced final played in Bristol. The strength of the HASSRA ladies, once again played a crucial part and HASSRA’s captain, Sian Hughes, started with a win, proving too strong for a spirited and much improved Lisa Wallbank. Defence’s no. 3, John Ashton, soon levelled the match with a win over Robert Wilson and with this pattern repeated at strings 1 and 4 the overall match was levelled 2-2 with just the no. 2 players left to go on court. Defence’s Merv Davies, however, was to prove too strong against HASSRA’s Paul Woodruff and went on to take Defence through to the final.
The second semi-final between RCSL and SPARTA in a similar way saw the strength of the RCSL ladies as being crucial to their potential success! Although they won both, RCSL’s Pat High-Comer had a close battle with SPARTA’s Angela Kennedy, just managing to win 10-8, 10-8, 10-8, with a sigh of relief! That’s as good as it got for RCSL and all three men succumbed to their opposite numbers, although RCSL’s no. 3, Paul Angelides, put up quite a fight against SPARTA’s Dan Willetts before going down!
So the final would see last year’s winners, Defence line-up against the previous Champions, SPARTA. With SPARTA already conceding the no. 5 ladies spot they would need to win the remaining ladies match and two out of the three men’s clashes – a tall order! All went to plan for SPARTA in the early stages when Angela Kennedy nervously edged past the spirited opposition of Defence’s Lorna Riggs by 3 games to 1. John Ashton at no. 3 however kept Defence’s nose in front with a fine 3-0 win over Dan Willetts. Then came probably the best match of the Tournament between the no. 1 players Marc Aldridge for Defence and SPARTA’s Adam Curry – the outcome of which would be crucial to both sides! The first game saw Curry edge ahead and in a nip and tuck battle of high quality squash Curry managed to keep this advantage and take the first game 9-5. This pattern was repeated in the second game and the shot-maker Curry once again overcame the tenacious retrieval work of Aldridge with another 9-5 score-line. The start of the third game saw a glimpse of light for Aldridge when Curry showed some early signs of tiredness – enough to encourage the ever youthful Aldridge to keep the ball in play and exploit the opening! In a long battle the game slipped away from Curry who when serving 4-5 down suddenly saw the final points quickly evaporate to a 4 9 score line. The fourth game went easily to Aldridge 9-0 and although Curry put up a brave fight in the early part of the fifth, Aldridge was still moving too well for his opponent and went on to win the game 9-3 and take the match for Defence. The last tie between the no. 2 players was now all about personal pride and in an excellent performance to underline his return to full fitness, Defence’s Captain, Merv Davies saw off the talented Mike Nichols 9-6, 9-6, 9-2.
Defence had won their tenth Championship and moved themselves into 'double figures'!
The third and fourth place play-off was won by HASSRA ‘A’ who beat RCSL by 4 matches to 1. This produced some excellent squash but none more memorable than the clash between the no. 1 players, HASSRA’s Chris Beldon and RCSL’s captain and Irish International player Geoff Irwin. With the overall match already lost to HASSRA Irwin, standing 2-0 down in games and 8-2 down in the third game, staged a most remarkable comeback to save six match points, take the third game 10-8 and then go on to win the next two games 9-7 and 9-1. Down but never out! Well done Geoff!
The Plate final for the 3rd place teams in the groups was won HASSRA ‘B’ who defeated Land Registry 5-0. This success followed on from their previous night’s victory when they saw off all other teams convincingly in the evenings Team Quiz. Consolation for the Land Registry team was some coaching from one of the club coaches, so we can perhaps expect great things from them next year.
Trophies and medals were presented by CSSRA’s Chairman Linda Parsley and thanks were extended to Nottingham’s Squash Club for once again providing us with their excellent facilities. Players comments were encouraging with friendliness, social aspects, standard of facilities and organisation being key enjoyment factors.
The next Squash Event will be the Age Group Tournament, again to be held in Nottingham on the 8th and 9th April 2011. Information on this and other CSSC squash events can be found on the CSSC squash website – http://www.cssc-squash.co.uk
After that, next season gets off to a great start with the Squash Singles being held as part of the CSSC Games at Loughborough on 15th & 16th September 2011. This will be a graded event to cater for all standards. Being held in the Games means that there will be a fantastic atmosphere with lots of social events provided by CSSC. Details on the CSSC website – http://www.cssc-squash.co.uk
