Racketball inter-counties played at Thame Squash Club
Dorset Racketball Team travelled to Bucks Last Saturday 26th September to take part in stage 1 of the premier league group 2.
The team comprised of Jamie Broomfield, Theo Woodward,Alexis Smith,Colin Bunch,Mark Hurd And late reserve Simon Brown, who took Steve Prestons place due to a ongoing hamstring injury.
Dorsets first match was against the hosts Bucks, Who's team was slightly depleted due to a wedding ,of which three of the Bucks team attended. Dorset Started strongly with Mark Hurd taking the 5th string out 3/0, Alexis Smith in the meantime was having a titanic battle with the Bucks no3 and narrowly lost 3/2. Colin Bunch, Jamie Broomfield and Theo Woodward then made short work of there No's 4, 2 and 1 respectively to give Dorset a 4/1 victory and 19 points on the board.
Dorsets 2nd match was against Warks who are generally regarded as one of the stronger teams in the premier league. Alexis Smith was first on and after his efforts in the morning ran out of steam and went down 3/0. Next up was Simon Brown who took on a wily Rob Shay at 5, who proved to experienced for Simon who also went down 3/0 Theo Woodward was next on and played brilliantly to beat his former Edgbaston team mate and coach Nick Hines 3/0. Colin Bunch and Jamie Broomfield both took to the court knowing that they both had to win to secure the match, Colin playing a lad half his age played well but lost a close match 3/1, in the meantime Jamie Broomfield who likes his court time played a marathon with the warks no1 and pipped him 11/9 in the 5th to give Dorset two vital rubbers and more importantly 7 points.
Sunday mornings match was against Kent the national county champions. With results of the other matches having gone Dorset's way, Dorset needed to take just 5 points to secure 2nd place in the week- ends fixture and a place in the inter- county final would be there's. First up was Simon Brown at no 5, He battled hard to scrape a game losing the first 17/15 after that he was shattered and eventually lost 3/0. Colin Bunch played well at no 3 but went down 3/1. Once again the pressure was on for some valuable points. Mark Hurd at no 4 played a slightly lack lustre opponent and won 3/0. Just one more point needed!. Theo Woodward at no 2, who had not dropped a game all week-end looked favourite from the start and won convincingly 3/0, we were through. Mr Broomfield was not going to rest on the teams laurels and realised that if he could magic up a win Dorset would beat the current national county champs. Jamie played yet another marathon match which this time did not go his way eventually losing 11/7 in the 5th.
A great week-end was had by all and a really good team spirit prevailed!. We will need our Big guns for the final, Andy Corben has already agreed to play and I'm talking to the other guys, so hopefully we can give Yorkshire, Devon and Kent a run for there money, in the finals.
Mark Hurd - Dorset Racketball Team Captain