Dorset Ladies competed in Division 2 of Summer County Cup at Ilkley from 19th – 23rd July 2010. This was only the second time in their history that they had been in Division 2 and on the previous occasion they were relegated.
The team consisted of Hayley Biddle, Michelle Farley, Kate Warne-Holland, Anna White, Lizzie Toop, Anna Sharp, Emma Magson, Jodie Bratchell and captain Karen Adams.
The weather was atrocious for most of the week and unfortunately we only managed to play on grass for 3 rubbers out of the total 15. The rest of the time we played on a mixture of courts of indoor and outdoor acrylic and artificial grass.
Our first match was against Warwickshire and after losing 3 tight 3 set matches we ended up losing 9-0. This did not fully reflect the closeness of the match, however, Warwickshire went on to only lose 1 rubber the whole week.
On Tuesday we played Devon outside on artificial grass and encountered torrential rain for a significant part of the match. Due to the fact we only had 3 indoor courts both teams were determined to complete the match and at stages were screaming at the amount of rain and ringing out their grips. Despite the terrible conditions the team fought tremendously and we won 7-2.
Wednesday we played Leicestershire indoors and again managed to lose 3 tight 3 set matches and were defeated 7-2. Thursday was always going to be tough against Lancashire and playing indoors again we lost 7-2.
Friday turned out to be the decisive match to avoid relegation. We were playing against Derbyshire and whoever lost would be relegated with Devon. The first round on hard was very tight and we managed a decisive 2-1 lead. The next two rounds were played on grass and we ended up winning 6-3.
Once again we struggled to get a team to Ilkley, however, the commitment of the players who represented Dorset was fantastic. Anna drove a 600 mile round trip with her 5-month daughter to play for 2 days and Lizzie flew to play for 3 days. Kate had to juggle her coaching around in order for us to field 6 players and Michelle travelled 4.5 hours on a train from Wrexham.
We were thrilled with the fact we had managed to remain in Division 2 for the first time in our history considering the size of Dorset compared to the larger counties. This only makes us more determined for next year and we are fully committed to gain promotion next year to Division 1 at Eastbourne.
Karen Adams
Dorset Ladies Captain