WINTER SEASON AND BEYOND!
1) Winter season
The Club entered a winter high ten teams in the North Kent/Kent leagues. Results overall were mixed with a couple of hard earned promotions offset by a couple of relegations. However, we received four promotions last winter (two relegations), so in the round the club’s status in these leagues is higher than it was 12 months ago.
North Kent League
Pride of place in North Kent goes to our Men’s one team who, in an incredibly tight finish to the season, won Division 2A. They fought valiantly in the divisional final before going down 1-3 to a very good Willett Rec team. Congratulations team and hopefully you get a kinder draw in Division 1 then previously. Men’s 2 retained their status in Division 2 by finishing fifth (of six) teams in Division 2B.
After promotion last winter our Mixed Doubles team finished third of five teams in Division 3. However, the bottom team finished on the same number of points as us, which shows the importance in winning any rubber, even in defeat, since this is how league placings are settled.
Mid week Mixed Vets finished fifth of six teams in Division 3. The team secured the same number of points as the team finishing third, but dropped a couple of places due to losing more rubbers than a couple of teams.
Kent League
Congratulations to our Vets 2 team for securing promotion by winning all their 4 matches in Division 5B. Unfortunately they were unable to attain silverware, going down to a strong Margate 2 at the weekend.
Following promotion Vets 1 got a really unfair group and succumbed to their first ever relegation after losing all 4 of their games in Division 2B. Vets 3 successfully avoided the trapdoor for a second successive season by defeating Herne Bay 2 to finish fourth of five teams in Division 5A.
Men’s Over 60’s ones exceeded expectations by surviving in the top Division (of six) winning two of their five matches to finish fifth. Our fledgling Over 60s 2 team unfortunately finished bottom of Division 6, with just the one victory to show from three matches played.
Finally following an excellent promotion last winter, our Men’s 1 team were automatically relegated from Division 3 for failing to fulfil a fixture away to Tunbridge Wells. The team were unaware that this would be the case, so hopefully a valuable lesson has been learned, albeit the hard way!
2) Summer season
The season commenced on 23rd March and we will be fielding 10 teams. Whilst each year becomes harder to win promotions as our teams continue to rise through their respective Divisions, I am confident the club will at the very least win a couple more trophies this summer.
Let the games begin!