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:
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:
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