Bulls vs Chesham Juniors

Bull's Interim Captain Jim 'The Chicken' Cooper writes:

With Captain Pig and the Camel away on a pre-Easter retreat it was a somewhat makeshift Bulls team who were at home to the Juniors on Tuesday night. The Juniors are riding high in the division, just below the cream, which is of course our very own 2nds and Bears, so we went into the match a little apprehensive. 

First up was the Python, recently returned from a spiritual trip to the subcontinent, against their captain, David Jordan. Ches needed all his guile and court craft to keep his opponent from running everything down and took the 4th comfortably 9:2 with some excellent lobs and drops but credit to David, who played well in the last to take the match 3:2 after a long and very hard-fought game. 

Meanwhile, the Fox was doing battle on court 4 with Tim Leslie-Smith (AKA “Rimmer” from Red Dwarf). Now Trev’s not been in the best of form since Christmas. It’s even been suggested his orchids have shrivelled but it seems this was all the impetus he needed to regain his trademark mincing swagger. Trev took the first and 3rd but smeghead parried with the 2nd and 4th. Would Trev crumble like the hairdressing nonce we’ve grown accustomed to? No Sir! He gritted it out, manned-up and delivered a much needed win and 3 points for the Bulls. Hoorah!

The Chicken was on next against Simon Clark and like the other matches, this one swayed back and forth until we reached the decider, when I’m afraid to say Simon stepped it up and played a great game to take the match 3:2. What a p*sser! 

On court 4, the Koala was entertaining Tom Paine in the first-string match. Regrettably, Kev’s flash of new year brilliance has not been sufficiently sustained and he wasn’t able to detain the youngster for long, going down 3 love. 

That left Bulls newby “The Rhino” to take on Andy Piper in the last match of the night. This was a game of contrasting styles, if ever there was one. Andy began by taking the first game and 7 points of the second with an imperious serve and drop game. The ball was getting colder and colder and Chris was frankly all at sea but he dug in, chased a lot down and miraculously scrabbled a 10:8 win from nowhere in the second. Andy countered with the third but with a new game plan Chris upped the pace, moved Andy around and in customary Rhino fashion took the match in 5.

So a very tight match, with 4 of the 5 games going to 3:2 and a very good night, played in the right spirit throughout. Even the Pig didn’t seem too disappointed with the outcome!