After gaining promotion last year, it was a fitting start to the season to have an eerily semi clouded super huge moon shining brightly on the Needingworth gladiatorial arena to take on St Neots Vets 1.

With Skipper John still incapacitated but giving moral support from the bench, it was a welcome sight to see Colin King creak onto court with his artificial hips to start the men’s doubles with stand-in Captain Jim.  Taking on old sparring partners of James Fewkes and David Muskett, the rubber developed into a tight affair with some good old-fashioned hard-hitting tennis.  Over on the other court, Sue and Jane were in a full-blown scrap with the 1st set evenly balanced at 5-4 on serve and everything to play for.

Onto the men’s 2nd set which was much the same as the 1st.  With both sets having more winners and forced errors than anything else, it was down to just a couple of unforced errors that made the overall difference and rewarded St Neots with a 7-5, 6-4 win.

With the men’s match finished and James desperate to get a quick exit, it was time to see how the ladies were getting on.  The scrap they were in, developed into a battle, and after over an hour of tennis, they found themselves the tie-break winners.  With James champing at the bit to get off, and Jim worried about missing out on the chips, their 2nd set started.  It was now no longer a battle, both teams were dug into what became outright trench warfare, with each player competing to see who could lob the highest and get closest to the baseline.  Sabrina Ashley and Karen Wilson might have won the prize for the highest lob, but fortunately, after more than 2 hours of tennis, our stars won the rubber 7-6, 6-4, giving the home team a chance.       

With everyone playing well, the mixed element became mega important.  Sue and Jim set about the task in hand both diligently and with intent.  Needingworth carved out a narrow lead, helped by Sue’s miraculous return of a blistering smash on the baseline and casually popping it over the opposition’s heads as if it was an everyday occurrence.  Their heads dropped even further when Jim went into full self-defence mode and luckily turned a vicious point-blank range volley into a little lob to win the set.

Jane and Colin weren’t getting much change out of their opposition and inexplicably went down 6-0 in the 1st set.  Could an extra jacket for Jane and a squirt of WD40 for Colin make a difference?  The only thing we knew was the pressure was on for Sue and Jim to win their next set to secure some points. 

We were only too happy to oblige and as we got better and better, we watched the opposition make more mistakes.  At 4-0, we heard cheers from the other court as Needingworth finally won a game.  With the end in sight and the knowledge that the Pub were keeping the chips warm, we sprinted to the finish line, winning 6-3, 6-0.  Congratulating St Neots on a well-earned draw, Sue took the opposition to the pub while Jim watched our pair bring St Neots to their knees and win their 2nd set 6-4 to secure a glorious win for Needingworth.

Because our 2nd pair were earwigging and heard the words honourable draw uttered, sitting in the pub, wallowing in our victory, they suggested I’d written them off and should eat humble pie.  I prefer to say it was my inspired captaincy that drove them onto victory.  I leave it up to the readers to decide.