Warwickshire Golf
Men's 2nd Team v Nottinghamshire - Match Report
Bears 2nds Cobble Nottinghamshire 2nds
After the disappointment of losing to Staffordshire in the July fixture, we were looking to get back on track with our home match against a very strong Nottinghamshire side – the winners of the 2nds league for the previous two seasons. The venue for this match was the fantastic Stratford Upon Avon GC.
Unfortunately our Captain Chris Staite was unable to attend the fixture due to an illness in the family and he had asked me to take over Captaincy duties for this match. Fortunately I had Mr Positive (aka Michael Bridger) to aid me on the day
The selected team was:
Alex Smith Copt Heath
Alex Spencer Ladbrook Park
Cameron Bridger Maxstoke Park
Chris Laird The Warwickshire
Curtis Neale Nuneaton
Jack Sharp Moor Hall
Lewis Watson Handsworth
Paul Dakin Copt Heath
Paul Reeves Ladbrook Park
Richard Bush Coventry
Before details of the match, I’d like to make a special “thank you” to Curtis for making his debut and at such short notice as he was called up at 4pm on the day before the fixture – whilst driving back from playing at Celtic Manor in Wales.
Stratford had been closed the day before the fixture due to storm Antoni. However, the course was in magnificent condition and the greens were rolling pure and at a super pace.
After the standard coffee and bacon rolls, the morning foursomes began. Our order was:
Richard & Chris
Cameron & Jack
Alex Smith & Paul D
Paul R & Curtis
Alex Spencer & Lewis
I acted as starter on the 1st tee and made my way to the back of the 5th green when the final group had teed off. There was a worrying pattern to the position as the matches went through 1up, all square, 1 down, 2 down and 3 down. Not a pretty pattern for Team Warwickshire.
The picture was looking slightly worse after the 10th hole as the positions were 2up, 1 down, 5 down, 1 down and 4 down. We needed to get something from the last 4 matches and hope that Richard and Chris could maintain their lead; otherwise we would be leaving ourselves a mountain to climb. Mike was telling me he had a good feeling about the matches but I was struggling to see why!
Fortunately, Michael was correct in that Richard and Chris did keep their lead and ran out winning 3&1. Fantastic news came from match 2 where Cam and Jack won 4 of the next 6 holes to win 3&2. Sadly the last 3 matches were unable to turn things around, despite their best efforts, so we were 3-2 behind at lunch.
I decided to shuffle the pack a bit in an attempt to get some points on the board early and the singles order was:
Chris
Cameron
Alex Smith
Jack
Richard
Paul D
Curtis
Alex Spencer
Paul R
Lewis
After 7 holes, things were almost going to my script to meet Michael’s “good feeling” as we were up in matches 2 and 3 and all square in match 4. Unfortunately we were down in matches 1 (Chris realising that missing fairways off the tee was not a good strategy) and match 5. Things didn’t look too good in the bottom half of the order either, with us being up in match 8 but down in all of the other 4 matches. So we were 3.5-6.5 down at this point and it was time for the Bears to up their games.
Michael reminded me that he still had a good feeling and I asked him if he was still taking his medication! But Mike must have a crystal ball as, after 13 holes the top 5 matches were 4-1 in our favour and the bottom half of the order was getting exciting too (up in 1, all square in 2 and down in 2) so we were now 6-4 up – could we pull off a remarkable recovery?
Positive news on the WhatsApp group was starting to come through as matches were finishing:
Cameron won 4&2
Chris won 1 up
Richard won 3&2 (having been 1 down after 7)
Alex Smith won 1 up
And, very impressively, Jack won 1 up having been a fantastic tussle with only ever 1 hole in it
So, the top order had gained a clean sweep, but we still needed a point from the bottom half to secure the overall victory. Paul D, Curtis and Lewis were up against very seasoned campaigners from Notts and all suffered close losses. This meant we were reliant upon the Ladbrook boys (Alex Spencer and Paul R) and they didn’t let us down. Alex maintained and extended his lead with some powerful hitting and deft short game play, running out a 3&1 winner. Paul was in a tight game and again there was never more than a hole either way – a half probably being the right result (although I suspect Paul would say otherwise!)
Michael’s good feeling turned out to be correct as we won the singles 6.5-3.5 to win the overall match 8.5-6.5. Although we cannot win the league, we can leapfrog Notts into 2nd place with a win away to Derbyshire at the wonderful Kedleston Park on 3rd September.
My special thanks to Michael Bridger for trying to keep me positive throughout the day, to my team of players for a fantastic team performance, to Anthony Wain and his team from Notts for playing the game in a terrific spirit and finally to Stratford Upon Avon for letting us have use of their brilliant facilities.
Neville Gardner
Acting 2nd Team Captain
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