In hot sunny weather, a Chiswick TC mixed doubles team played a Surbiton LTC team on Saturday afternoon in an excellent match, the standard was high and the two sides were very evenly matched.

In the first round, Katie and Ed got off to an great start, Katie hitting strong groundstrokes and Ed having some success at the net. They went 5-3 up, at which point their opponents, Laura and Pete started to get back into the game, Pete in particular playing well at the net. It got to 6-6, but seeing as we’d been playing for over an hour already, and the match on the next court was 4-4 in the second set, it was decided to play a super-tiebreak to settle it, which the Chiswick pair won 10-6. Meanwhile Harriet and Barnaby were having a similarly close match against Ivana and Oliver. The Chiswick pair started strongly, big serves and powerful forehand groundstrokes, and won the first set 6-1, however Ivana and Oliver played their way into the match, and won the second set on a tiebreak 6-7 (4). The rules dictated that another tiebreak be played, however time was ticking and it was decided to call it a tie.

So the score at the halfway point was Chiswick 3- Surbiton 1. 

In the second round, Katie and Ed started well again, but lost a bit of focus half-way through the set, and Ivana and Oliver capitalised, winning the first set 6-3. The Surbiton pair also started the second set strongly, going 3-0 up before Katie and Ed raised their game, winning 6 games in a row to take the second set 6-3. A tiebreak was played, however the Chiswick pair never really got going, and lost 10-4. Which meant it all came down to Harriet and Barnaby against Laura and Pete. The Chiswick players played an excellent match, closing out some great rallies at the net, and won 6-4, 6-3.

Final score: Chiswick 5- Surbiton 3.

The players headed indoors for a late lunch, salad followed by fruit salad, discussed their upcoming seasons in the Middlesex and Surrey leagues respectively, as well as opportunities for playing competitive mixed doubles, which in our case (ie in Middlesex) would be mainly the Middlesex Summer Cup (which is just mixed) and the Middlesex Winter Floodlit League (which has a mixed category as well as men’s and ladies’).

Well done, everyone, this was a fun match and an excellent performance against a strong opposition team, and a good warm-up for the league season, which will start in 2 weeks’ time.