Match v The MCC

Saturday April 24th & Sunday 25th 2010

 MCC received 2 points for the court in all matches

Saturday

Sunday

Match v The Jesters

Saturday April 17th 2010

The Jesters at Jesmond Dene, April 17th, 2010

Match Report by Simon Sanders

This was my second year of managing this fixture after taking over from Freddie Such - and who should write requesting a place on the team "for a nostalgic return to Jesmond Dene"?  None other than FS himself, up from London/Oxford for the day.  And like last year, I was keen to include in the team a Scottish Jester or two, and to bring in a Jester who is new to real tennis.  With the unavailability of some of my low handicap candidates, my team lacked a little of the balance of last year but produced a good geographical spread of Jesters from London, Manchester, Ripon, Edinburgh and Fife.

The match started with Alex Todrick, one of the three of us down from Scotland, being well beaten 4 - 8  by Jesmond's in-form Simon Johnston. If Simon was nervous about facing The Jesters again after the dramatic but ultimately happy consequences to his match last year against Francis Hamilton, he didn't show it! Alex who was perhaps still feeling the depressing effects of a return from a well-deserved holiday in Croatia then partnered my real tennis novice Richard Mellis to a further defeat 2 - 8 at the hands of Simon J and Ben Stothard. Richard is an experienced squash player from Edinburgh and made the most of the hour of acclimatisation on court arranged for him before the match. Thus prepared he proceeded to play most unlike a novice and soon provoked calls from Jesmond onlookers for an immediate downward revision to his provisional 65 handicap. The last match before lunch continued in the same direction - Freddie and I on the wrong end of a narrow 5 -7 defeat.

Sitting down to lunch and a glass of wine in the dedans however seemed to change everything - for the better! Your team captain and report writer found hidden reserves in the delicious whatever-it-was for lunch which propelled him to an 8- 4 singles win - a rallying call picked up in the next match by Robert Ash and the aforesaid Richard Mellis who came out 10 - 3 winners.  A recovery to transform the fixture seemed very much on the cards as Robert then raced to a 4 - 0 lead in his singles match against Jesmond's Colin Smith.  But the post-prandial power started to ebb away as Colin, though clearly far from fully fit, showed all his guile and experience to peg Robert down at the hazard end for a frustratingly long period of play, thus turning the game round in his favour to win 9 - 5.  Admirable for Colin, disappointing for Robert.

At last now it was time for the star attraction - John Duns, the current Jesmond Dene Club Singles champion against low-handicap Jester Jamie Bebb.  A match of high quality ensued in which John's persistent attacking play proved too much for Jamie whose customary elegance and clever placement were not enough to save him from a 3 - 7 loss to the better player on the day.

For the finale Jamie was joined by Jesmond's Paul Hetherington as a stand-in Jester against Alan Douglas and John Duns.  What a match for those of us fortunate enough to be there watching!  High quality doubles play in the true Jesters spirit with all four players not allowing their strong competitive natures to get in the way of the enjoyment of being able to play at that high level.  For the record, the Jesmond pair emerged the 10 - 8 winners and completed a 6 games to 2 drubbing of this year's Jesters.

The bottle of fizz, which your reporter had placed at the door at the start of the match to provide for those on court a quick and instantaneous toast to a winning gallery hit, was still surprisingly full enough at the end to enable us to raise a glass of thanks and congratulations to our hosts, and to beg to be invited back again next year.