Crediton 2 vs Exe G&CC 5 (A) 19.1.12 R: 17-7

Crediton Two's excellent start to the season continued last night at Exeter Golf & CC 5. Away games against this team are never easy and so it proved. Mike Trick v Connal Platts and Bradley Taylor v Brett Cullis were first on court. Mike's tie was close and full of good technical play, Mike kept focus and secured a 3-0 victory, 15-8, 16-14, 15-9. Meanwhile Bradley Taylor was also involved in a close game with lots of good rallies. Despite looking in good form, Bradley went down 3-2, 11-15, 15-10, 15-9, 12-15, 13-15.

Next up were Bradley Sheahan and Manish Ghandi. Despite lots of clever technical play by Manish, Bradley managed to keep on top of his game to squeeze out a 3-0 victory, 15-9, 15-13, 15-10.

The final two games involved the number 1's and number 5's. Pete Harvey took on Robin Turl and Jon Rattenbury played Jon Ironside-Smith, in a replay of a tie in the 1st half of the season. A confortable start for Jon I-S saw him take the first game 15-7, he then squandered a 7-1 lead in the second allowing Jon Rattenbury to get a foot hold in the game, winning the set 15-10. The revival was to be short lived though, with Jon I-S reasserting his game and securing the next two 15-6, 15-7 for a 3-1 win.

This left the overall tie in the balance and rested on who won the contest at no.1. Both players were lively, chased hard, had good shots and treated all to some tremendous rallies. Pete Harvey edged the first 15-13, before succumbing to Robin in the 2nd 12-15. Into the third and a determined looking Pete re-established the lead with a 15-9 victory and in a nailbiting 4th, which could have gone either way, Pete manged to edge out a 15-13 victory, winning the match 3-1 and the overall tie for Crediton 2, 3-2, 17-7.

Well done team a good result. Next week sees a mouthwatering top of the table clash as Torquay 6, currently 26 points behind in 2nd visit table topping Crediton 2.

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A new look Ollie Coupe (at 5 & Man of the match) looked dynamic and in control when leading 2 games to 1 against

superfit Louis Robjant. However he couldnt close out the 4th and the audiemce was on the edge their seats
throughout the 5th. Ollie was 9-10 down and dominating the rally when a lucky 'nick' killed the match.
4-11 11-1 11-5 8-11 9-11. His best performance this season and will win soon.
Ed Pattison (at 4) was never far away from Bruce Macdonald but could not close the gap losing out 3-0
Meanwhile Mike Harris (at 1) disposed of Christian Turner in 3 straight games with displays of brilliance as usual!
Steve Rickard (3) pushed Andy Street all the way but again could never quite gain a lead losing out 0-3
At this stage we could so easily have had the match set up at 2-2, (maybe not easily)!
Sam Ellis (at 2) had just arrived back from Belgium exhausted and still matched the vastly more experienced and higher
ranked Gary Bennet point for point throughout the match losing out 9-11 11-13 7-11
 
A creditable performance and the team is visibly improving match on match. The vastly higher standard in the premiership
is hard to adapt to but I feel sure there is a win coming soon. Next fixture is away at Exeter University on 21st Nov 7.30 start.