Lincs were in Group 3A with Beds, Yorks and Hereford & Worcester. It turned out to be one of the strongest groups in the competition, and one of my fellow captains actually described it as the “Group of Death”. On the Friday we began with Beds, and despite a poor weather forecast, it remained dry all day though overcast and wind free, unusually for Eastbourne. Beds looked a solid team with a strong No1 and so it proved. Things began well as Alec Allen belied his age yet again and won the No2 singles for us 4+4, despite being 4-1 down in both sets. Dan Stuk, on debut for us, then took on Jamie Evans in the No1 singles match. It was a very high quality match with little to choose between them throughout. Evans took the first set 6-4 but Dan kept scrapping and hitting some great winners to make the second set even closer. He had a couple of set points at 5-6 but Evans held on to his serve and then took the tie break to leave it 1-1 after the singles.
The doubles proved less close. Our doubles pair of Alan Brown and Terry Hunt lost 3+4 to their opponents, and then went down to the Beds top pair to leave us 3-1 adrift. Alec and Dan mopped up the final doubles fairly comfortably to make the final score 3-2 to Beds, which was probably a fair result.
Saturday was fine bright and breezy, as Eastbourne typically is, and we took on Hereford & Worcester whose No1 is the current national O35 champion Colin Bennett. Alec started well and was a set up before his opponent, Griffiths, started to resist more and force a tie break in the second set. Unfortunately, at this point, Griffiths hit a purple patch to take not only the second set tie break but the deciding champions tie break as well – he just could not miss and Alec was left wondering how it had happened.
Dan then took on Bennett at No1, but he proved just too strong and match tight and it finished 2+3. In the first doubles, Alan and Terry started really well and were a set and a break up before their opposition dramatically improved to take 5 games in a row to win the second set from 6-2. A second champs tie break went against us and so we were then 3-0 down. Alec and Dan again won their doubles fairly easily, but Alan and Terry could make little impression on the H&W top pair so it finished 4-1 to them, which was rather harsh as it would have taken very little for it have ended 3-2 in our favour.
This left us needing a heavy win against Yorkshire, who had won their two matches and so were leading the group, to have any chance of staying up. Unfortunately the heavy rain swept in on Sunday morning and play was soon abandoned so we were denied even a chance to pull off a great escape. Nonetheless, we had 2 good days of tennis in a very strong group and the lads enjoyed themselves over the weekend.
For info, this was my 10th year of captaining this team since I came in to O35s in 2005 and I had decided to step down before this year’s event. We have had a great run over this time and played in groups 1 or 2 for 5 of those years but I felt it was time for a change. I have discussed it with the team and Dan is happy to take on the captaincy with assistance from Alan on the administration front.