Cambridge Women’s team of Laura Morrill (captain), Emma Kudzin (secretary), Kadi Liis Saar, Georgia Archer-Clowes, Sophie Walker, and Corina Balaban led by 4 matches to 2 after the singles on day 1 at the National Tennis Centre in Roehampton on Monday. The second day was curtailed with rain and matches had to be moved indoors but again the girls performed well in the reverse singles and were 9 matches to 3 up going into day 3. On day 3 the girls only needed to win 2 matches from the 9 doubles to secure victory. After the first round of the doubles the girls were 12 – 3 ahead with all three pairs winning. The two reserves Lizzie Gordon and Georgina Kilbourne then played the final two rounds and won both matches including beating Oxford’s first pair to ensure Cambridge finished 16 matches to 5.
The Men’s match was a far closer affair with Oxford being very strong at one and two and in fact the top two players won all their matches. The Cambridge team of Cameron Johnston, Kirill Zavodov, Bruno Monteferri, Kenny Taubenslag, Sven Sylvester, Greg Caterer and captain Nick Jenkins were much more even in depth and it was this depth that prevailed.
On day one after the first round of singles Cambridge were 4 matches to one up – winning the bottom four singles. Day two followed a similar pattern with the top two losing and again the bottom four singles all being won by Cambridge giving them a 8 – 4 lead going into the 9 doubles matches. After the first round of doubles the match score was 9 -6 with Cambridge’s third pair losing a cliff hanger 9/8 in the third having had match points. Oxford then won two matches in the second round to leave the score at 10 – 8 but Cambridge held their nerve and second pair of Zavodov and Taubenslag won the deciding rubber 6/2, 6/4.
Coaches Sue Rich and Nick Brown were delighted with the results and overall team performance.