The Men’s Seniors recovered from the 8-2 defeat last week to post a very important 8-2 win against fellow relegation contenders Downend. With only matches against the top and bottom teams remaining, this could be the result that keeps us in Division Two next season.

Poor Richard Chapman! Last week he fell on the court and injured his lip, chin and elbow. This week he drove all the way from Bruton to Downend (over one-and-a-half hours), parked in the neighbouring car park, and found the car park locked after the match! He had to catch a lift home with Andy Jeffery, Chris Cox and Pete Goldsmith, and had a long car-recovery operation on Saturday.

However, he did have a major part in probably one of the best results of the season, together with partner Pete. They opted to play on the darker court (one floodlight was out), and played the Downend A pair of Adrian and Alan.

Downend didn’t dare try lobbing Lofty Pete at the net, so kept giving it to Richard at the back of the court, and Richard just ground them down with consistent and enormously-long rallies. Anytime the Downend pair let one stray to Pete, he volleyed it away. The 6-2, 6-1 win may look easy, but it was a carefully crafted effort by both Writhlington players. Great play, Richard and Pete!

Chris and Andy took on Simon and Mike, and made hard work of their 6-4, 6-4 win, helped by some spectacular misses by the very competent Mike.

With the intermittent drizzle continuing, we got straight on with the second rubbers.

Simon and Mike were obviously given the low-down about Richard and Pete at half-time, and adopted a more aggressive approach, causing the Writhlington pair to go down 6-2, 6-4.

Chris and Andy got into an awful mess against Adrian and Alan. Wrong tactics and a catalogue of errors put them 5-2 down, but suddenly everything clicked and they won the set 7-5, with the last three games being “to love”! Adrian and Alan were crestfallen, and the second set rolled in to Writhlington 6-3, which enabled Chris and Andy to continue their “never-beaten” run.

Downend are now ten points behind Writhlington, but next week could be crucial – they play the bottom team and we host the top team!

Andy Jeffery