Cambs Squash

Report: Inter Counties Stage II Premier RELEGATION.
Location: Lumb Farm SC, Derbyshire
Date: 7th/8th March 2009.

Match 1: Cambridgeshire v Buckinghamshire.

With the threat of relegation into the national 2nd division looming over their heads, the Cambridgeshire boys knew that a good start was vital in order to calm their nerves. With a strengthened team, things looked good. Powley and Rossin went on first at 5th and 3rd strings respectively. The skipper Rossin made a strong on a very cold court taking the first game 11/8. Unfortunately his opponent starting playing better in the 2nd taking the game 11/6. A disgruntled Rossin decided to buck up his ideas and took the next two games relatively comfortably to take the match 3-1. Good start. On the other court Powley was playing his usual grinding style against a similarly matched opponent. However the ‘old dog’ was a little bit too strong and experienced for his younger opponent, taking the match 3-0. An even better start?!
Next up was Steffan against a multi-talented racket player (he is better at Tennis!). Steffan started ‘slowly’? In fact he was so much at sea that he must have taken at least 5 ‘taxi’s in the first game alone. However all was not lost. The guy has not played for the county 9 years in a row for no reason. Despite not having much practice before the weekend Steffan visibly started to play better, taking the 2nd and 3rd games with some attacking squash. Unfortunately Steff could not keep it up, losing the next two games very narrowly, despite having match balls.
So it was up to either Harry at 1, or Sammy at 2 to get the match won. Harry went on first against Tom Phipps (a former England U19 international). Harry was up for it and basically steam-rolled his talented opponent with some excellent volleying and pressure squash. Harry took the match 3 zip and Cambs secured the 5 bonus points. Now it was up to Sammy at 2 to get some more points. Unfortunately it wasn’t Sammy’s day. Despite playing some good squash, it wasn’t quite enough to beat a ‘machine-like’ Tom Power, who chased everything down, eventually forcing the errors from Sammy’s racket. It didn’t help matters that Sammy served out … an amateur error. Despite Steffan’s encouragements and continually shouts of, ‘keep on your toes Sammy’, the great white hope of Cambridgeshire went down 3-1.
All in all it was a solid start. A 3-2 (17-7 victory against Buckinghamshire).

Match 2: Cambridgeshire v Leinster.

After a very relaxing lunch and an hour and a half sit down/sleep it was up to Rossin and Powley to get the team off to a good start against the ‘Irish’ from Leinster. Rossin went on the cold court again as Powley had pinched the warm court AGAIN. Rossin started slowly despite a good warm up. Unfortunately things went from bad to worse as he couldn’t get himself moving to the front of the court. Despite trying his hardest, it just was not happening, going down 3-0 in 3 tight games. So it was up to the old man of the team to even the match score. Despite being 2-0 down James dug in and battled back to 1-2. In the fourth it was a battle royal. Powley was chasing and retrieving hard. At 13-12, match ball down James was still in with a chance as his opponent looked visibly tired. However James proceeded to go for a ridiculous cross-court nick off the serve which just about his the bottom of the tin?, good decision James, not.

So things were looking decidedly bad at 0-2 down in rubbers. It was now up to Steffan and Harry to even the scores. Despite Steffan’s efforts he couldn’t breakdown a very wily opponent from across the Irish sea. The guy looked like Bjorn Borg and he had roller-skated across Europe in 2 months one summer for fun (1650 miles!). Steffan played well but could not find an answer to his opponent’s length, going down 3-1. It was now up to the top order to get some points. A fired up Harry took on an Irish international. Leitch played some of the best squash I have seen him play to beat his opponent 3-1 with some very attacking and entertaining squash. Despite giving his captain lots of abuse whilst marking, Rossin was very pleased that he had ground out the victory. At the same time a lack lustre Sammy was losing to another Irish international 0-2. After a great team-talk/ encouraging chat from Steffan, Sammy finally woke up and started playing something that resembled squash, taking the match 3-2. Both Harry and Sammy dug in very well to win 3 vital points for the team.
A 2-3 (8-17) loss to Leinster.

Match 3: Cambridgeshire v Derbyshire.
With Harry gone back to the ‘shires’, it was up to Ahmed to fill in at 5. The match on paper versus Derbyshire was always going to be close, and that is how it turned out! Ahmed the ‘fro-boy’ went on first at 5 against a very experienced campaigner. Ahmed looked in control at most points in the match and at 2-2 10-6 up it seemed like Ahmed was certain to get the first point on the board ….. unfortunately the Derbyshire player dug in and somehow managed to slavage a 3-2 victory. At the same time Steffan had finally found his form, destroying a very capable opponent 3-, playing some fantastic squash. So at 1 all things were looking tight. Powley and Chambers went on at 4th and 1st string respectively. Powley started slowly, however again like Ahmed looked comfortable. After a team-talk from the skipper and Morgan, he started to play some good squash to take a 2-1 lead. Unfortunately this didn’t last. His opponent started piling on the pressure, taking the 4th and 5th. At the same time Chambers had started extremely slowly against the England over 35’s captain, Kev White. At one nil down Sammy started to play a little better, however White was in no mood to be beaten and ground down an under-weather Sammy, beating him 3-0.
So it was all down to Rossin. He knew that he needed to get 2 games to ensure Cambridgeshire’s survival in the national 1st division. To make matters more interesting Rossin had beaten his opponent 3 days earlier in the Derby league, 3-2 in a titanic struggle that lasted 1 hour and 25 mins. Anyway at 1 nil down things were looking bleak. However thanks to some good support from the Cambridgeshire faithful and Rossin digging deep he managed to play some better squash taking the match 3-1. Cambridgeshire stayed up, by the skin of their teeth! Despite losing 2 matches and Derby winning 2, the boys from the ‘shires’ stayed in the 1st division.
A 2-3 (10-15) loss to Derbyshire.

FINAL RESULT
1 Leinster 43
2 Cambridgeshire 35
3 Derbyshire 31
4 Buckinghamshire 29

Neil Rossin – County Captain