Inter Regional Championships – September 13th & 14th, Sand Bay, Weston Super Mare
The majority of players arrived at the venue late Friday afternoon/evening given the long journey. The weather forecast for the weekend was not good with wind and rain predicted for both days. However, it was a bright sunny Saturday which greeted the squads, with many players pleasantly surprised to see the sun!
Championship – 8 teams
Kent immediately got into their stride with a 6-2 win over newly promoted Yorkshire, including 2 fannies. This level of determined play was sustained with 5 more round wins including an 8-0 win against Anglia – our bogey region last year. We finished with a disappointing loss to reigning champions Chiltern 3-5. This meant that we took a very narrow lead of just 1 game overnight into Sunday.
Special mention must be made to Kent 2 (Becky Edwins, Scott Ashby & Jason White) who won all 7 games having accumulated 91 points with just 16 points against. An incredible achievement! Three other Kent teams achieved 6/7 wins on the Saturday:
Kent 1 – Dean Ashby, Kai Sheffield & Federico Faucher
Kent 5 – Barry Menzies, Ivan Russell, Keith Atkinson & Richard Wenban
Kent 6 – Alex Spillett, Geoff Booth, Rob Booth & Russell Brewis
On Sunday Kent completed 4 more round wins and so played the final round – round 12 – against Chiltern with games level overall! Kent had a slightly better points difference of +24. In the end this was immaterial as Kent achieved a terrific final round win 6-2 to take the title! This was a squad who dug very deep over 2 days to shake off the disappointment of the last few years and finally win the Championship. They showed determination, consistency, belief and strong team morale and support for each other. The only slight disappointment was Kent 2 losing their last game to Chiltern, which left them with 11 out of 12 wins. However, Kent 3 beat Chiltern 4, who were also undefeated going into round 12, this lead to Kent 2 still being Best Overall Team of the whole tournament!
Thanks and praise must go to the squad manager Corinne Cooter, who provided encouragement, energy and advice over the 2 days.
Challenge – 4 teams
The four teams showed a mix of experience and also rookies – Ciara Costigan, Gary Clarke, Sonya Davis, David Mowl & John West making their first inter regional appearances.
The squad made a poor start losing 0-4 to Yorkshire in Round 1. This was followed by a 3-1 win over Anglia and then 3 further 2-2 draws against Scotland, Eastern and Mercia. Long games limited time for reflection and lunch! So Saturday night Kent were second bottom in the division and in the relegation zone.
Squad manager Mark Cooter was inspirational in talking to the whole squad Sunday morning, and also giving pointers to individual teams of what was needed to avoid relegation. Kent 9 (Carolyn Edwins, Martin Pennell, Peter Clark & Mark Toulson) were the top performing Kent team in the Challenge with 8 out of 12 wins. Kent Challenge managed to turn their fortunes around and finish 5th in Division 1, retaining their place for next year.
Juniors – 1 team
This was the last Inter Regional competition for juniors Tegan Finley & James Rudden, and a first experience for Leo Sargent. Zac Finley was the reliable glue between these levels of experience and play. On both days the Juniors won 2 rounds out of 5, showing spirited and determined play but also recognising that losing control of the jack was costly in 2 matches.
Full results and standings from the weekend can be found here.
A marvellous weekend of celebrations and friendships as Kent achieved a first Championship win for 10 years in biblical rain on Sunday afternoon. After 4 continuous hours of torrential rain players were truly drenched but their spirits remained high! Chiltern’s final total of 67 games won would have been good enough to win 8 of the previous 10 Championship titles. Kent’s total of 71 wins is the highest since 2005.
