Week 14 of the ELTTL Season and we’ve only got one match to report on.
 
In Division 2, Team 3 of Craig Linton, Kristian Skotzen and Bob Porteous travelled to Bathgate to take on high flying West Lothian 3 in one of those fixtures which was potentially a “must not lose” game. A win would see Team 3 end the first half of the season in third place in the Division and only a point behind their opponents. A draw would keep them in touch. A loss and not only would they fall off the pace and make it very difficult for the second half of the season, but they would harm Team 2’s season as West Lothian would leapfrog them on game difference to lead the Division. So not much on the line! Keith MacKay v Bob was first up and in a topsy turvy contest Bob came out on top 11-8 in the fifth. Andrew Morrison is WL’s number 1 and he proved why with a 3-1 win v Kristian in Game 2. Craig then took on Noel Sison in a cracking match that went the distance. A 12-10 defeat for Craig was a hard one to take. Match 4 also went the distance, this time Bob not able to get over the line as he fell to Andrew in five ends. 3-1 to the hosts and the Midlothian side were in trouble. Craig got the visitors within 1 again with a straightforward win v Keith but an equally straightforward win for Noel v Kristian restored the two game advantage. The doubles saw Craig and Kristian storm through the first set 11-2 – but then the wheels came off as the next 3 were lost – 5-2 down and on the brink of defeat. Andrew v Craig and Noel v Bob were next up, and both went to five ends – but the Penicuik players lost both of them and the win was secured for the hosts. Kristian won the final match of the night but a 7-3 defeat for Team 3 damages their promotion aspirations. It could have been so different – FIVE 5 enders and only one of them went the way of the visitors. Two of the four losses were deuce in the fifth – oh if only….
 
With only one match this week, there was an argument that we shouldn’t bother with a Player of the Week Award. That argument was strengthened by the fact that all three players only won 1. Decision made! Instead, we are giving a special “Player of the 1st Half of The Season Award” – that’s a really snazzy title, not!
 
Now this is a tough one. If we are basing it on averages in the League, then Krzysztof is top dog – 93% in Division 2. He's so committed that he's back in Poland for Xmas and despite the weather still practicing on an outside table (as pictured). But he’s only played 15 out of a possible 27 games and according to his teammates, the 4 matches he’s missed have all been against really good opposition!! If we are basing it on improvement then a big shout out to Roscoe who has stepped up a Division and has still improved his average. If we are basing it on commitment to the Club, then James has to be in with a shout – not only captaining Team 3, available to play up for Team 1, organising all our TT purchases, getting our kit organised but also available to step into the breach when the McDonell coaches “have better things to do” first thing on a Saturday morning. But none of those are winning the award this time.
 
The award goes to a Club member (we still claim him as one of us) who hasn’t actually played this season for us. For anyone who has not read his story, head over to the Scottish Vets Website where you can read a cracking article written by the man himself, Steve Collins. A horrendous diagnosis in May 2024 put him out of action – for many of us it would have been difficult to pick ourselves up and battle on. Our Club President still remembers with horror and shock the phone call he received telling him of the news. But he also remembers the courage, strength of character and sheer determination which was clear from Steve to battle against the odds. We could all take a leaf out of Steve’s book – his positivity was astounding. Immunotherapy courses have followed and throughout it all Steve has kept up his positive outlook and a great desire to get back to playing TT. Fast forward to September and the nutter entered the Veterans Banded Event – a gruelling day’s table tennis for anyone! He survived it and has continued to turn out – most recently seen by us at the Scottish National League! Not quite ready to come back into Edinburgh League action but we’ll keep on at him! As the end of 2024 approaches, all of us at the Club send Steve our very best wishes as he continues his battle. Your award awaits you when you get over to Penicuik Steve!
 
As for controversies, we don’t normally do any in the week before Christmas but this season we have a special request to look back a few weeks. The player himself asked us to get his name into lights. So, we turn the clock back to the Scottish National League in November. In Penicuik’s match against the Joe Wilson Club, that old topic of “over exuberance” comes under the microscope. In a fairly important match, the Joe Wilson entourage, led by one of our favourite players, Noah Fletcher (who wasn’t even in the team) seemed to applaud and cheer on every good point won by their player, as well as cheering on any average shots where he won a point or even any mistakes from his opponent. Oh, how we hate that type of behaviour! It’s just not good sportsmanship. There were two or three occasions when the applause came after a net/edge from the Joe Wilson player. Not one to shy away from such conduct, our Penicuik player indicated that it was outrageous to be clapping in such a situation. The response from Noah was that he / the entourage “never saw the lucky element of the shot”. Hmmm – maybe. Or maybe they were just doing it to get under the player’s skin. In the end, the match went to five terrific ends and the “over the score” support didn’t impact the result. But that’s not the point. As we’ve said on numerous occasions, we have no problems with vociferous support and encouragement, or player led cheers / screams of joy – but surely only when a good shot has resulted in the point being won. Cheering on an opponent’s unforced errors is poor and should be removed from the game. Ah well, that should please Noah who was disappointed that he hadn’t made it into our Report earlier in the season – Merry Xmas Noah.
 
No more controversial issues to address – it’s the season of goodwill after all! With the festive season upon us we wish all our Members and TT friends (particularly those pantomime villains from West Lothian) a Merry Xmas and best wishes for 2025.

Week 13 and in the Premier League, Team 1 of Colin Green, Greig McDonell and Peter Aird were hoping to finish off 2024 with a win and to alleviate some of the pressure upon them towards the foot of the Premier League Table. They faced Haddington 1 at Ladywood on Thursday 12th December and whilst not a “must win”, a positive result would certainly provide a much needed boost to the Team’s first half of the season. Peter Lugton, Carsten Giebeler and young Fergus Randall (deputising for Matt Munro) made the trip to Penicuik. Colin v Peter was first up, and Colin took advantage of a somewhat out of sorts opponent for a comfortable 3-0 win. At the same time Peter was 2-0 up against Carsten and had two match points in the third – when those points didn’t go Peter’s way, Carsten seemed to gain in confidence and came back for a 3-2 win. Greig defeated Fergus before wins for Colin v Carsten and Peter v Fergus gave the hosts a 4-1 lead. The next two singles saw Greig v Peter and Colin v Fergus. Greig somewhat surprisingly came out on top 3-0 and a similar score for Colin gave the hosts an unassailable 6-1 lead. The doubles followed to make it 7-1. Match 9 saw Greig v Carsten and with the home player coasting to victory Carsten decided to change things up a bit as he whacked a 90mph ball into Greig’s eye! Ouch – he’s not going to cry is he, came the comments from his really supportive teammates. Carsten seemed quite pleased – the only thing which could have made it better was if Colin had been the opponent! An injury timeout before the trooper that he is, Greig returned to quickly lose the match! The two Peter’s brought the night to an end; a night Mr Lugton will want to forget as Mr Aird triumphed to give the hosts an excellent 8-2 victory.
 
Turning to the Handicap Cup, Haddington were also the visitors to Penicuik as they faced James Wighton (+1), John Bald (+7) and Charlie Brindley (+1). The visitors were Nicolas Lehel (+4), Loan Nguyen (+4) and Jackie Whiteside (+6). So, all positive handicaps which should have made the match a quick one. With a 3 point start in Match 1 for John v Nicolas, it looked like the match would indeed fly by as John won the first end 11-3 but it then got tight. The visitor took the next 11-9 before John restored the lead with a 12-10 victory. But back came the Haddington player to win end 4 11-9 before John got off to a great start in end 5. 6-2 up it was his to win – you know what’s coming – 3 deuces before Nicolas triumphed 14-12 in the fifth! Charlie’s match v Loan was equally as long! A similar 3 point start – this time for the visitor and the first four ends were shared 10-12, 10-12, 11-8, 11-5. Charlie did just about enough to get over the line 11-8 in the fifth. When James went on against Jackie, giving his opponent a 5 point start to 11, time was marching on – Team 1 were about to finish their 6th game by this point! Not another five ender surely – 11-8, 8-11, 11-8, 9-11 as James looked decidedly tense against his defensive style opponent. Like Charlie, he found some good shots when required as he won the decider for the loss of only two points, 11-7. Match 4 saw Charlie take on Nicolas and at 2-0 up this was going swimmingly for the home player – but hold on, Charlie, noticing Greig’s “ball in the eye” injury, needed to go one further as he started seeing zigzag lines in front of him, suffering from a migraine! He probably should have conceded but instead battled on only to lose the last three ends 4-11, 6-11, 3-11. 20 ends of table tennis played, and it was 2-2! With Charlie having to sit out the order on the scorecard was changed a little – John v Jackie was the first straightforward match of the night – a 1 point start to the home player wasn’t needed as John played some lovely, controlled table tennis for an 11-8, 11-2, 11-8 win. That was followed by two matches simultaneously – John defeated Loan in three ends and that left James v Nicolas for the win – James played much better in his second match as he secured a 5-2 victory for the hosts in an eventful night of handicap cup table tennis.
 
And that was it in Week 13 for the TT played so our Player of the Week award has limited options. It looks like a straight fight between our two undefeated players, James and Colin. The latter played some great stuff against Haddington winning his 3 singles, almost at a stroll, and combining with Peter for a doubles victory. James on the other hand was undefeated in his Handicap Cup match and got the team over the line with the all-important fifth win on the night. But he only played two matches so difficult to give him the award we think! That surely means it must be Colin this week. Well – he didn’t actually win the Player of the Match Award from Haddington, Greig got that award. In fairness Greig did play some of his best table tennis of the season, until big bad Carsten dented his confidence and his face! If Colin can’t win the Player of the Match award then he’s out of the running as well! This week’s winner is a man who took our Club President under his wing as a young lad in the early 1980s and he was old back then! Remarkably, some 40 odd years later (and he looks no different) he is still loving his TT, and it was really his two quickfire wins which changed the direction of the Handicap Cup fixture in the home side’s favour – Well done to John Bald.
 
As for controversies, let’s carry on our theme of having a go at West Lothian over their refusal of a postponement to our Team 2 but then getting a postponement from our Team 4, only for Team 4 to be unable to field a full team in Week 13. Outrageous! Oh, hang on a minute. West Lothian did what? They agreed to postpone further after Rachel called them very late in the day to say she couldn’t get a team together! Well, there you go. That really spoils this controversy! Thanks to WL for doing the decent thing.
 
So instead let’s turn to the Handicap Cup. Every year we seem to go through the same rigmarole of trying to arrange fixtures and recently we’ve seen more and more concessions come into the Cup. We were due to have three teams in action in Week 13, two of them playing against Edinburgh University. We are told that these days the fixtures will take place in the Handicap Cup Week identified and on the home night of the team you’re up against. For us that meant two teams visiting St Leonards Land on Friday 13th December. Or in fact it didn’t as the students could not get their venue on that night. With the assistance of the Handicap Cup Secretary, it was suggested that we could switch the fixtures to Ladywood on Thursday 12th December – the students couldn’t do that either. Had it been our home matches that’s exactly when the games would have been played and so just fortunate for the Uni that they were the home teams in the draw! We also offered to play at Ladywood on Thursday 19th December but that was also not a possibility. One of the Uni teams can play on Friday 20th December (assuming they could have got their venue which wasn’t guaranteed) – but Xmas parties and getting ready for Santa made that impossible for us. One of the Uni teams can offer us dates in January when the league has restarted and we’re not sure about the other. With a busy league schedule, and particularly because we mix our teams up, postponements of Cup fixtures just cause chaos! It’s bad enough when a postponement is for three players from the same league team but trying to field players from different teams, considering their different league fixtures, is a headache which would cause Charlie to have another one of his migraines!  That’s probably why not every club plays in the handicap cup and why most clubs put in a limited number of teams. Whilst we fully accept that there was nothing the Uni could do about getting their venue, it’s our view that if a team cannot make the specific week of the Handicap Cup then that’s it – walkover to the other team. It happened in the first round – we couldn’t get a team to Murrayfield on the date set – no point in asking for a postponement – match conceded. Murrayfield had a match at ours that they too couldn’t fulfill, match conceded. Harsh when there are genuine reasons why the match cannot be played but it certainly makes things a lot simpler!
 
And finally, we touch on how dangerous a game Table tennis can be – our Club President had his Xmas Work Night out on Friday 13th and after the “accidental” behaviour of that nasty Haddington player, he had to wear dark glasses and don his Roy Orbison gear to avoid looking like he’d gone a couple of rounds with Tyson Fury – Colin thought he was going to have to visit A&E on his way home on Thursday night – and that would have been really inconvenient for him apparently:

Week 12 of the ELTTL Season was a quiet one for the Club with only three of our five teams in action
 
In the Premier League, despite recruiting a new player to the team, only Colin and Greig were available to make the trip to Bathgate to take on West Lothian 1 on Wednesday 4th December. Up against it from the start, at least the visiting pair could look forward to a quick night – well not really – played on two tables it was still 9.30 before the matches were finished – how on earth did we ever get through matches when everyone just played on one table?? There were some tight games but ultimately only the final match of the night went the way of the visitors as Colin defeated Noah Fletcher.
 
On Thursday it was quiet at Ladywood with only Team 4 in action as they hosted Edinburgh International 3 in Division 3. After their win v Haddington was confirmed by the League Committee, Team 4 struck it lucky again as Ed Int could only muster two players for the trip to Penicuik and they were delayed on different buses getting to Ladywood. Patrick Shanks, Chamika Diyunugalge and Rachel Petrie took to the table for the hosts and when Rachel defeated Ken Benjamin in match 1, the hosts only needed one more win to secure a point. Chami went the distance in match 2, coming back from 2-1 down for a terrific 15-13 fifth end win and the draw was secured. Patrick won his first match of the night and that secured the win. In farness to the visitors they won the remaining four fixtures including a truncated best of three doubles but the hosts were over the moon with a 6-4 victory.
 
Meanwhile, away from home, Team 5 travelled to Bathgate to take on West Lothian in Division 4. In a shocking week for being able to field full teams, only John Bald and Ian Miller were able to turn out for Team 5 – this match was quick – John was unlucky losing out in five ends in one of his matches but the writing was on the wall from the outset as the Bathgate side ran out 10-0 winners.
 
And so here we go again with a pretty straightforward Player of the Week award! Last week it could have gone to one of about 8 players – this week we didn’t even have 8 players in action. All of Team 4 won 2, but one of those wins for each of them was against that guy called Mr Walkover.  The only other winner was Colin who won 1 (in fact the same number of wins as Team 4 if we exclude Mr Walkover). It’s a tough one – Rachel got the player of the Match award from Edinburgh International, so that’s good enough for us – well done Rachel!
 
As for controversies, sticking with our theme of postponements from previous weeks, we note that a “newish” rule was recently brought in for intra-club fixtures.
 
“For re-arranged matches between teams from the same club that are not played within four playing weeks the match will be void and no points awarded to either team…….. Such intra-club fixtures cannot be conceded by one team to the other - it must either be played (within four weeks) or be declared void, with no points to either team.”
 
WL 1 v WL 2 in the Premier division ought to have been played on Monday 28th October 2024. It still shows on the Website as “postponed”. Unless our maths is wrong that’s significantly more than four weeks. Will the league treat the match as void? For what it’s worth we’ve never really seen the issue with intra club fixtures being treated differently than other fixtures – it was brought in, we recall, to try and stop shenanigans at the end of the season where one team might need points to survive or gain promotion etc. That presumes that clubs would be willing to pull a fast one in such a situation.
 
It’s not really that different for inter-club fixtures.
 
 “In the event of a revised date not having been agreed upon and the fixture played within four playing weeks of the originally scheduled date, the fixture will be awarded against the team requesting the postponement.”
 
Has that rule ever been applied? We are aware of a number of postponed matches which are played more than four weeks after the rescheduled date. Look no further than our friends from West Lothian 1 (AGAIN) – their match v NM 1 ought to have been played on 20th November – it's at least re-scheduled – but nowhere near within four weeks – new date is 22nd January 2025.
 
Or what about the rule which says that no team (other than the Uni teams) shall be allowed more than one postponement request in each half of the season? There are plenty teams who have had more than one postponement already. The point here is that the Rules seem somewhat pointless. Of course, each of the above rules is subject to a get out of jail free card whereby the rule can effectively be dispensed with if those involved get the “express permission / consent” of the Match Sub-Committee. We’re genuinely not sure whether teams / clubs seek such consent / permission or whether they just proceed on the basis that if no one is causing a fuss and it’s agreed between the relevant teams, then just get on with it – and we support such a stance being taken - but that begs the question as to why the Rules are there at all.
 
Speaking of West Lothian and postponements, we previously discussed our Team 4 giving their Bathgate opponents a postponement despite another WL team refusing to allow us one. Lo and behold, scheduled for week 13 and guess what? Our Team 4 can’t field a team of three from their four available players!! Unreal! If WL want to do the decent thing they should agree to play 2v2! Just shows that being nice doesn’t work out all the time!!
 
Week 13 already and the first half of the season virtually over.

​Week 11 of the League again saw four of our five teams in action, with Team 4 this week sitting out. All four teams played on Thursday 28th November and it was busy again at Ladywood with Teams 1, 3 and 5 all in action.
 
Team 1 saw Colin Green, Peter Aird and new recruit Ryan Docherty take on Edinburgh International 2 in a match which could only be described as a “must win”. Ryan, new to the Vets table tennis circuit this year, helps reduce the average age of the 1st Team, not by a huge amount, but enough to take them from above 60 to under 60!! Peter was first up and got the home side off to a good start with a four end win against the stylish Chandru. Ryan’s first taste of Edinburgh league action came against the unique ultra-aggressive style of Artur Labecki – 2-1 down and a bit worried, Ryan found his form and won the last two ends 11-3, 11-6 amid various moans and groans from his opponent. When Colin defeated Adam Alnak in Match 3 the hosts were off to the perfect start. It got better for the Penicuik trio as the next three singles also went their way with the loss of only one end. Used to playing with Greig or Peter in the doubles, Colin couldn’t believe that Ryan actually moved out of the way when playing doubles rather than leaving Colin to try and knock his partner over when trying to retrieve a ball! A 3-0 doubles victory was followed by three further singles wins as the hosts recorded a 10-0 victory – a good start for the newbie!
 
Team 3 have had a bad couple of weeks, and they were looking to bounce back as they faced Murrayfield 8 – that wasn’t going to be easy, the Edinburgh side having upset Team 2’s undefeated season the previous week. Bob Porteous, Charlie Brindley and Kristian Skotzen were in action for the hosts.  When Bob lost out to the awkward style of Lynn Somerville in Match 1 and Charlie lost a close five ender in Match 3, there were clear signs that this was going to be tough. Kristian won his first two matches of the night, however, to tie the scores at 2-2 after four games played. Bob and Charlie then went the distance in matches 5 and 6 – Bob squeaking over the line in match 5 before Charlie lost another close one – 3-3 with the doubles to follow. Bob and Kristian knew how important this match was and perhaps nerves got to them a little as they fell to a 3-1 defeat. With the last three singles to play, the hosts knew that all three were required for the win. Kristian rounded off an excellent night for him individually with a win in Match 7 before Charlie faced Lynn. Charlie certainly got his monies worth with yet another five end match – this was the closest of them all and included wins in ends 2 and 3 for Charlie by 14-12 and 17-15 scorelines. This time he held his nerve in the decider for an 11-8 win. Two thirds of the way there could Bob pull off an excellent come from behind victory for Team 3 in his last match. It started well with an 11-6 first end win but he never recovered from a poor 2nd end as the Murrayfield team secured a 5-5 draw. Two losses and a draw in the last three weeks has seen team 3 fall away a little from the top of the table but with 2nd placed WL still to play, they could yet finish the first half of the season pushing for a promotion spot.
 
Team 5 were coming off their worst performance of the season as they faced Edinburgh International 4. Roscoe Cairney, Phil Daly and John Bald were looking to put last week’s match behind them and were given a real boost when their opponents could only field a two player team. Effectively 3-0 up, Phil got the hosts off to a great start with a victory over Alan Gracie who will no doubt have been disappointed to lose out 11-9, 11-9, 11-9. When Roscoe then defeated Arpit Gupta in four ends a point was already secured for the hosts. Alan and Arpit kept the match alive, however, with wins against Roscoe and John respectively. Roscoe has never beaten Alan having played him several times over the last few seasons and felt he had a real chance this time, just losing out 11-8 in the fifth. He got his revenge in the doubles as he combined with John for a comfortable 3-0 win and with that the two points were secured. Alan defeated John in the penultimate match of the night before Phil took on Arpit to bring the night to a close. According to Phil this was the match of the night and he’s already been in touch with the Committee putting his case forward for this week’s player of the Week Award. A five end nail-biter and Phil got off to the worst possible start, 5-0 down at the changeover. He found a way to win, however, and pulled it back for a 12-10 victory. (Enough for POTW Award – we’ll find out later!) A 7-3 victory for Team 5 which means they already have the same number of points as they accumulated in the whole of last season when they were playing in a lower division!
 
Away from home on Thursday, Team 2 were also trying to recover from a bad week – they lost to Murrayfield 8 in Week 10 and now had to travel to Ocean Terminal to take on Murrayfield 7. Ian Hislop, Krzysztof Laszkiewicz and Gary McDougal were trying to steady the ship for the visitors. Kris came back from 2-1 down in match 1 to secure a five end victory but when Gary and Ian both lost their openers the hosts took a 2-1 lead. Kris levelled the score with a win in Match 4 but a loss for Ian in Match 5 handed the advantage back to the Edinburgh side. Gary secured an important win in match 6 to level again going into the doubles. Anyone who reads these reports will know that Team 2 have a shocking doubles record – 8 matches played and 8 defeats. Thursday saw Kris and Gary combine in the knowledge of how crucial the doubles was going to be in another tight match for the visitors. Was this going to be the night for a doubles win? Eh, no! Make that 9 defeats out of 9 for Team 2! So, 4-3 down and Team Captain, James receiving updates via text was resigning himself to more dropped points – Come on James, have some confidence! Match 8 went to five ends. The two ends Ian lost out of the first four saw him suffer 11-2 defeats. Somehow, however, he called on all 80+ years of experience to win 11-9 in the fifth. The match was still alive. Kris then won Match 9 to secure a point, and it was left to Gary to play match 10. A straightforward 3-0 win for Gary followed as Team 2 squeezed home 6-4 to bring their first half of the season to an end.
 
Last week our Player of the Week Award was as straightforward as could be. Really difficult this week! All of Team 1 were undefeated. Kris was undefeated for Team 2. Kristian had an excellent night for Team 3. Phil came back from the dead for an undefeated night for Team 5. How do we split them? We couldn’t really decide so at the PTTC Xmas Night out on Saturday, young Michael was given the casting vote. Phil thought he was a certainty for the award – Michael is his grandson! Michael is a sensible young lad though and recognised that Phil’s undefeated night included a win against someone called Mr Walkover! In addition, he was aware of grandad indicating to Colin upon seeing our new Team 1 player in action that if our Club President was looking for a new team he could become a reserve player for Team 5! Although Michael was amused he accepted that such comments ended any chance Phil had. Even the attempts by Phil to bribe Michael didn’t work! Kris won his 3 in a 6-4 victory – they don’t come more important than that. But he lost the doubles due to his lack of mobility according to Gary. Newbie, Ryan? 3 wins and a doubles victory? Close Ryan but Michael felt you will need to repeat the job a couple of times before you’re in the running. Colin or Peter? Well, if Ryan’s not getting it neither are you guys. So, what about Kristian? As his teammates were getting embroiled in five end tussles throughout the night, Kristian took care of his opponents in style winning three in a 5-5 draw – but he also lost out in the doubles! In the end it was a straight fight between Kris and Kristian. The former wanted to point out to everybody who would listen on Saturday that he’s currently top of the individual averages in Div 2. Michael wasn’t impressed – he was even less impressed by the jumper worn by Kris to the Xmas night out – Kristian had made the effort with a lovely woolly Xmas jumper and that got him over the line - well done to him!

And so, to our controversy of the week section.  The ongoing saga of Team 4’s walkover win against Haddington 4 was resolved on Friday night at the ELTTL Committee meeting. We were taken aback that the issue had an agenda item all to itself. Why was that? Surely the score would have had to have been recorded as a win for the matter to have then been appealed? That would be the only basis for the Committee to be involved wouldn’t it? There hadn’t been any appeal as far as we know. Bizarre. Even more bizarre when Team 4 pointed out a specific add on to the rules (which we think only came in this season or perhaps last). The rule about requesting postponements had a sentence added to it in the following terms:
 
“A request for a postponement is just that, a request”.
 
If that’s what was specifically brought into the rules it’s even more bizarre that the matter was up for discussion at all! In any event the score card has now been approved!   
 
Finally, Team 2 were left unimpressed by the “new” (maybe temporary) venue of their Murrayfield opponents last week at Ocean Terminal. The players seemed to agree that the conditions were very poor in general but in particular playing against a background of pure white walls with white balls didn’t help those older team members whose eyesight isn’t great at the best of times (not singling out Ian H at all)! There was a motion made at the end of last season to have orange balls used where the walls were white – Team 2 certainly thought that should have happened at OT.
 
Oh well not many league games left before the festive break. Week 12 is upon us.