UPHILL Badminton Club’s annual in-house ladies’ and men’s handicapped doubles tournaments were held recently.

UPHILL Badminton Club’s annual in-house ladies’ and men’s handicapped doubles tournaments were held recently.

The men’s attracted an entry of 20, these being split into a top and bottom halves for the draw, the resulting pairs then played in two round robin boxes.

The top two pairs from each box qualified to the final box along with the best third place. The qualifiers were Rob Morray and Callum Grayson (-1), Wai Cheung and Jim Hadley (+1), Robin Curry and Keith Higgins (+4), Matt Cole and Bill Ponting (-6) and Paul Edwards and Grant Kelly (-11).

Handicap favourites Paul and Grant were unable to overcome their handicap and finished fifth. The winners were eventually Robin and Keith (81 points), runners-up were Wai and Jim (78), followed by Matt and Bill (76) and Rob and Callum (75).

A plate tournament was also held for the non-qualifiers with Brian Hadley and Carl Harrison (+1) – 84 points, just holding off Glyn Davis and Sourish Ganapathi (-2).

The ladies’ competition involved a one box round robin followed by a final between the top two qualifiers. In this competition, the two pairs of handicap favourites, Ellie Jewell and Emily Look (-6) and Christy Langford and Mary Dunn (-4) qualified from the round robin to play in the final.

For a long time Christy and Mary held a lead that was slowly pegged back by the more consistent play of Ellie and Emily. The last few points were tense and at 20-all, either pair could have won, but it was Ellie and Emily that managed to win the last point and the tournament.

Of the other pairs, special mention goes to Julie O’Sullivan and Kate Robinson (-1) who overcame a first game loss of 21-10 to finish fourth and to Maureen Matthews and Ellen Davis (+5) who finished third, despite having never played together before.

As usual the members were grateful to Eddie Prest and his team of helpers for their excellent organisation of both events.

? THIS week saw Uphill Badminton Club C, D and E teams in action with the C team losing and the other two winning.

The C team were away to Wyvern B, and gave a good performance despite losing the match by six rubbers to three.

Julie O’Sullivan and Maureen Matthews of Uphill, eventually lost to Louise Malik and Tracey Hooper in the third and the Uphill pairing of Matthews and Fiona Singleton worked hard before losing to Hooper and Elaine Waldre, also in three.

Robin Curry and Glyn Davis were stretched by Antony Forster and James Watson, but won in the third. Robin Curry continues to make good progress and was again the pick of the Uphill players, winning two of his three rubbers. The only player to win all their rubbers was Wyvern’s Tracey Hooper.

The D team were at home to Nailsea & Yatton C and won by seven rubbers to two. The team of Emily Look, Neil Burstow, Ellen Davis, Peter Rybaruk, Kate Robinson and Andy Potts all played well.

Uphill started the evening by winning the first three mixed rubbers comfortably. Then followed the best rubber of the evening, in which Emily and Ellen were beaten by Wendy Giggs and Alison Storm 25-23, 20-22, 21-16.

The only other game won by Nailsea & Yatton was the third ladies in which Alison Storm and Alison Hodgson beat Ellen and Kate.

The players to win all their rubbers were Neil, Peter and Andy of Uphill.

The D team is now joint top of Division 5 with Nailsea & Yatton B, both having 74 points and one game each left to play.

The E team, were at home to Chew Valley B and won an exciting match by five rubbers to four. This team of juniors consists of Caroline Higgins, Billy Fear, Emily Walker, Sourish Ganapathi, Felicity Pritchard and Callum Grayson.

In the first mixed, Caroline and Billy did well to beat Babs Fowles and Andy Reed. The next two mixed both went to Chew Valley. In the second mixed, Emily and Sourish lost in straight games to Evelyn Heighton and Stuart Metcalf, who they had beaten in the away fixture.

The third mixed was tough but Felicity and Callum eventually lost to Tina Toogood and Rob Newmarch. Then as was expected, the experienced Fowles won the first two ladies easily with her partners, which resulted in Chew Valley being four rubbers to one in the lead.

The boys then won the three men’s rubbers in straight games to bring the match level at four rubbers each. Then came the exciting third ladies’ rubber in which Emily and Felicity lost a tough first game against Heighton and Toogood, but then came back to win the next two games to record another win for the team.

The only person to win all their rubbers was Uphill’s Billy Fear.