Author Archive | Roger Nichols

Well, it seems only a few days since we were looking forward to a new season and yet here we are halfway through the season already! Where does the time go when you are enjoying yet another year of Abingdon and District Aunt Sally.

Week 9 should have been the first week of this season when we had a full fixture lists with all the teams numbers listed as byes in Sections through C to F were actually drawn against each other (team 2 v team7). Unfortunately the withdrawal of the Black Swan spoilt and Bystander C were the only side not playing last week as a consequence. 

Now to last week’s matches and top scorers. In the Premier Steventon Sports remain at the top of the table despite their first defeat of the season going down 4-2  when they visited bottom of the Premier Croft Nomads. In Stevie’s defence they were missing their leading doll scorer Colin Brind and his absence clearly upset them as in the first leg 4 of their 8 players act failed to trouble the doll!

Elsewhere in the Premier both Abingdon Utd/Con Club and the Plum Pudding  both recorded 6-0 victories against The Hart and Stanford FC respectively. The Bystander continued their recent good form and Jumbo Mott was the week’s leading doll scorer including the week’s only 6 doll maximum and hitting  14 cracking dolls at Berinsfield and he was  ably supported by Captain Steve Martin with Bystander winning 4-2.

Lots of double digit individual scores last week With Jumbo at the top of the tree with his 14, Barry Townsend and Dave Dix both hit 13 for Plum Pudding and Abingdon Utd/Con , Steve Enock hit 12 for the Croft and there were  11’s recorded by Phil Adams, Alan Bell, Paul Barrett in the Premier and Dean Bowler for the Red Lion in the A section and Paul Ealey for Abingdon RBL in the B section. Lot’s of 10’s as well last week including Dave Butler a welcome first double figures of the season, Geoff Lee. Paul Kelsey and Phil Soden for the College Oak A in the B section Richard Bunce and Ian McCregor for the Chequers, Charney and Steve Soden for the Grapes (matching his old man for bragging rights! Dave Heard for the Queens Arms Didcot and Karl Humphries for Abingdon Arms B also showed again that high scoring individuals don’t just belong in the higher section both contributing 10 dolls apiece for their sides.

I should also mention that Fox Denchworth who last week (8) recorded their first win of the season and probably against the local rivals  who they would most like to beat from up the road in Charney!! They followed that up with a share of the points against the Royal Oak.

A few interesting encounters tonight including the “battle of the Taps” in the E section as Brewery Tap A and B meet, College Oak A entertain Abingdon United C with both sides including a Worrell in their line ups and The Chequers have another West Berks derby when they travel to play the Bell at Grove.

Finally for this week we have a lot of discussions and sometimes debate about the handicap system, how fair it is, and why we need it. I think the reasons we need it are pretty obvious it’s to make the section’s as competitive as possible and also to give encouragement so that all games are competitive. It’s for broadly the same objective as the handicapping of racehorses based on previous form, golf uses handicaps and so does table tennis it’s a form of “levelling up”.

Out of interest and of no particular importance I have looked at the results in terms of average leg scores for the Premier/A and B sections after 9 games have been played and removed the handicap received by each of the teams in the Premier and A sections. The total dolls and  leg averages in rank order show the following:

1. Abingdon Utd/Con Club                                             566      20.96
2. Plum Pudding                                                                523       19.37
3. Steventon Sports A                                                       450      16.66      
4. Berinsfield A                                                                   449      16.63
5. Croft Nomads                                                                 443      16.40
6. Red Lion A                                                                      422      15.63
7. Bystander A                                                                     412      15.25
8. The Vine                                                                            400    14.81
9. Stanford FC                                                                       383    14.18
10. The Hart                                                                            380    14.07
11. College Oak A                                                                    373     13.81
12. Fleur de Leys                                                                     352     13.03
13. Abingdon United C                                                           330     12.22
14. The Plough                                                                          328     12.14
15. Abingdon RBL                                                                    312    11.55
16. Harwellian B                                                                        310     11.48
17. The Wheatsheaf                                                                   307     11.37     
18. Berinsfield B                                                                         300    11.11
19.  Abingdon Arms A                                                                259     9.58*
20. Eight Bells                                                                              252       9.33*                                                        

• Have only played 8 games, but total and average assume same doll count and leg average for the 9th game which was forfeited by both teams.

Using the actual leg average and the handicap added together means, shows that at this stage of the season  there is only 1.9 doll difference between the highest scoring team (no handicap) and the lowest scoring team (+5) in the Premier/A section. Without a handicap there would be a massive 7 doll difference and that would be neither competitive nor challenging for most sides in the Premier and A section. 

The comparison of scores for all teams based on actual results of the top 8 players is a much more useful way of determining the sections rather than straightforward promotion and relegation as is the norm in most sports.

My final word for this week is that the closing date for the final 4 competitions, Captains, Secretaries, Pairs and Singles is Monday 17th July. The Competitions will take place on Sunday August 6th at Abingdon United and the draw will be made on the day based on both entries and attendance.

Have  a good week

Don’t forget that the first of the competitions for teams of 3, teams of 4 and teams of 5 will take place this Sunday at Abingdon United.

The Competitions will start with the 3’s, followed by the 4’s and finally the 5’s. Play will commence at 2pm and each of the competitions will be played down to the final 2 teams with the 2 remaining teams of each Competition playing the final on Finals Night on September 13th.

There has been  a disappointing low number of teams entered this year with only 4 clubs represented, partly that is because many do not want to play on a Sunday and, I suspect largely because teams from outside the top sections are reluctant to enter competitions because there is no incentive for them to compete against the Premier/A section sides unlike in the 8’s competition which is handicapped. Spectators will be most welcome on Sunday and the Bar will be open!!!

We will need to rethink our Competition programme for 2024 and put any proposed changes either to format, dates etc to next year’s AGM. The Competitions represent our lowest income and our highest expenditure so the need for them to be attractive and encourage more participation needs careful consideration.

Draws for each of the Competitions on Sunday will be made 15 minutes prior to each of the Competition’s.

On a more positive note entries for the Pairs, Singles, Captains and Secretaries competition are much healthier and we have extended the closing date for entries until next month. These Competitions will take place again at Abingdon United, again on  a Sunday, August 6th. More details later in the season.

In the 8’s Competition 2 of the 4 quarter finals have already been completed with wins for Plum Pudding against the Bystander A and Abingdon United/Con Club overcame The Fox Denchworth 2 legs to 1 in their tie. The remaining games will take place in the next few days when Croft Nomads will entertain Abingdon Con Club and The Bell Grove will face Berinsfield SC A.

Well, at last I think we have sorted out all of the problems caused with the week 5 scores, several of which found there way into week 4 obliterating the correct week 4 scores that had already been correctly entered. All week 6 scores (with 1 exception) are now all entered so tonight it’s week 7 and the correct week number has already been  set and, more importantly I remembered to press the update button!

Well week 5 was a better scoring week for many with Phil Adams of the Plum Pudding leading the way with 14 dolls , ably assisted by Tosh Wooloff who contributed 11 dolls, their efforts were not enough to stop Croft Nomads edging home 4-2 on the night with Martin Robinson and the ever reliable Steve Enock both hitting 11 dolls. Also in the Premier/A  section AbingdonUtd/Con Club ruthlessly despatched Stanford in the Vale Fc 6-0 with Dave Dix, Leigh Clapton and Scott Humphries hitting a combined total of 36 dolls, that’s an average on the night of 4 dolls a leg each…………..that’s class throwing!

Elsewhere in the Premier/A section there were wins for Steventon Sports A for whom Colin Brind hit 10 dolls against Berinsfield, a 6-0 win for Red Lion over The Hart Harwell for whom Paul Leach’s 10 dolls was the outstanding contribution, but was to no avail in terms of points .

Bystander recorded their first win of the season beating The Vine 4-2  and quickly followed that up with a second win last week , this time  5-1 against the Hart with Jumbo Mott hitting 14 dolls including a 6.

Elsewhere in week 5 there was another maximum 6 recorded by Matty Cook for the Boundary House against the Bear & Ragged Staff in Section C.

Good week for the Worrell brothers who both hit 10 dolls, Jono for Abingdon United C against Berinsfield B and Dave  for the College Oak B against Red Lion B

Week, 6 threw up some interesting results with Abingdon Utd/Con Club both  Plum Pudding losing and  despite one exceptional leg of 28 dolls from Abingdon United the scores for both sides were  disappointing  against Steventon Sports and Red Lion respectively. Berinsfield with stalwarts Geoff Lee (14 dolls inc a 6) and Stuart Wilson (12) dolls in fine form saw off the challenge of Croft Nomads winning 6-0 with leg scores of 23-21, 25-22 and 21-17. For Croft Paul Stone and Steve Enock offered some resistance with 9 dolls apiece, but Berinsfield were worthy winners and rubbed it in by winning the beer leg as well!

There was an interesting second successive 6-0 win for College Oak B in the D section against Hanney RBL with Rick Selby top scoring with 12 dolls for the Oak. Hanney had the somewhat unfortunate and unenviable record of hitting 12 blobs from their total of 24 throws! Just one of those nights that the game sometimes throws up (or down)!

A couple of other interesting observations…Richard Bunce playing for The Chequers at Charney in C section has only played 2 games to date, but is currently averaging 3.5 dolls per throw and Dave Harris playing this year for his “local” the POW at Shippon  who  has already recorded a 6 this season is “topping”,   at 3.11 the averages in Section E. Ashley Jerome playing for Harwellian A also in section E hit 11 dolls for them last week when they claimed their third straight 6-0 victory and, to date, Harwellian A lead the way in that section having dropped only 2 points.

Finally, in looking at the League table I know Steve Fernback (ex Harwellian)  will be delighted to see that his new side The Fox, Boars Hill, after the recent adjustments, are leading the way in Section F!

Well, we have nearly sorted out all of the confusion that I caused last week by not updating the right week number before last Wednesday’s results started to be input. The remaining scores and amendments should be sorted by the weekend and the team and individual player scores for weeks 4 and 5 and therefore the league tables should be accurate by then! Once again apologies to those of you who are avid followers of scores and results, at the moment there are still some that need to be changed or updated.

As a result our week 5 high and low lights report is running a little late, but that again should  be available by the weekend.

Some good news for you who diligently put your results in as son as the match is over and thank you for that it is, if I have done my job right, very helpful. So this week the week number is already set at week 6 (tonight!) so there should be no repeat of last week’s debacle!

Enjoy your games tonight and as importantly enjoy what promises to be what is really promising to be our first really warm Wednesday summer’s evening.  

Unfortunately late on Wednesday afternoon we were advised that Black Swan Abingdon were withdrawing from the League. Black Swan who had been absent from the league for a number of years had only rejoined this season and had been placed in Section F.

Unfortunately despite the best efforts of their landlord and team captain a number of circumstances had left them unable to fulfil their opening fixtures. With the very real likelihood of that being a continuing problem we recommended that they withdraw and on Wednesday when, once again, they had been unable to raise a side they reluctantly agreed.

Any points awarded to opponents because of the Black Swan’s inability to fulfil their fixtures in the opening weeks will be removed.

Regrettably this means that for teams in Section F another 2  weeks without fixtures and reduces the league size to 7 and 12 games.; We would have wanted to avoid this, but hopefully as we know a number of sides have already arranged friendlies to fill “gaps” and hopefully this will continue as there are sides in other sections who also have “gaps” in their fixture list.

We will send to all secretaries details of all sides and their contacts who are without scheduled league fixtures for the rest of the season so those sides wanting to arrange friendlies know who might be available and when!

Unfortunately due to my administrative “cock up” the week number 5 which had been updated earlier in the week was over ridden by me yesterday and I failed to re-set it before last night’s matches!! Stupid boy!

This means than any team results submitted after last night’s matches and before 7.30 this morning would have been recorded as week 4 NOT week 5, worse still the correct week 4 scores previously input will have been deleted.

All can be resolved and it will give me something to occupy my day, but I do need to know who submitted last night’s result before 7.30 am this morning so that I can move their result to week 5 and I will also need to re-trace their week 4 scores and input those again. Can all teams who had input scores last night or before 7.30 this morning please let me know so I can start putting things right!

For a day or so this possibly means team scores, individual player scores and league tables are inaccurate, but all will be put right asap.

Sorry to all of you affected!!

Well, unless I missed it, last week was almost unique in that nobody managed to hit the ultimate leg score of 6.There were plenty of 5’s recorded, but the magic 6 proved elusive.

Top individual scorer on the night was Phil Adams with 13 dolls, but his efforts were not enough to secure a win for the Plum Pudding against Steventon Sports SC  who shared the spoils in a 3-3 drawn encounter and retained their unbeaten record in the Premier/A section.

Elsewhere Richard Berry hit 12 dolls for Croft Nomads who put on their best performance to date in beating Red Lion A 6-0 at Drayton, their first win at the Lion in their last 3 visits. Richard included a 5 in his 12 and in the first leg hit his first 5 sticks, but missed with his final stick. Berinsfield A secured top spot in the Premier section after their convincing win at Stanford FC.

Dave Dix returned after missing the previous week to top score for Abingdon Utd/Con Club in their win at the Bystander

In Section B Simon Skelly’s 10 dolls helped early season league leaders Fleur de Leys to a 6-0 win against Eight Bells and in the same section Andrew Wilson also recorded 10 dolls for The Plough, Long Wittenham but it wasn’t enough to prevent a 4 -2 home win for Abingdon Arms A.

Also in Section B Berinsfield B had a night to forget going down 6-0 to The College Oak A.

In the C section  Steve Fisher hit double figures and his namesake Stephen J. Fisher also contributed 9 dolls in their win against The Bell. In the same section Richard Bunce contributed 10 dolls for The Chequers Charney at The Grapes in a 4-2 win against the home pub’s B side.

In section D Croft Nomads secured their first win of the season 5-1 at home to Hanney RBL and  the RBL’s village neighbours The Plough  also went down to their heaviest defeat of the season against Bystander B  despite Mark Wheeler’s 8 dolls. For the Bystander Kevin Higgs top scored with 9 dolls.

So after 4 weeks how are the league tables looking? Berinsfield A are leading the way in the Premier, taking top spot from the unbeaten Steventon Sports A last week.

In the A section despite their second successive defeat Stanford in the Vale FC still lead the way and in the B section Fleur de Leys top the table closely followed by the College Oak A.

Section C is led by Abingdon Con Club and in the D section Bystander B have already opened up an 8 point gap  over their nearest rivals. E section  is led by The Midget who have a 100% record, but they are being closely pursued by both Harwellian B and the Prince of Wales Shippon.

Finally section F is led by The Wheatsheaf Didcot also with a 100% record, but the Fox, Boars Hill are on their tail!

Early days yet and there will be lots of chopping and changing over the next 13 weeks of the season and maybe even some warmer Wednesday nights for us to enjoy!

Well, last Wednesday saw a few shocks and in one or two cases some shocking performances!

Let’s start with the shocking performance the match between Croft Nomads and Bystander A in the Premier/A section where no fewer than 9 blobs were registered and in the case of yours truly and your Chairman both playing for the Croft, the shed door looked to be in more danger of being hit than the doll! Fortunately for the Croft the Bystander also struggled on the night and the collective score form the 16 players on the night was 81 dolls. To put that in perspective Steve Enock, Martin Robinson and the “handicap” were joint leading scorers with 9 for the Croft and the handicap of 12 was the “highest performer” for the Bystander!

Elsewhere a 6 from Darren Holmes, the only maximum of the week, (welcome back Darren) in his 10 and  10 from  Leigh Clapton was not enough to stop Abingdon Utd/Con Club, missing Dave Dix,  slipping to a 6-0 defeat to the Red Lion Drayton for whom captain Kevin Regan top scored, also with 10 dolls. Red Lion hit, without their handicap,  a remarkable 24 dolls in the 3rd leg, but in the first two legs the teams were only separated by only 1 doll and that was with a handicap advantage of 5 in favour of the Red Lion so it was a close encounter!

Plum Pudding also slipped to a defeat, losing 4-2 to The Hart Harwell. Again 10 dolls was the top score on the night for The Hart it was Paul Leach who and for the Plum Pudding it was Phil Adams who hit double figures. Again overall the scores were very close with only 1 doll between the sides on the night in the first leg with the other 2 legs shared.

Stanford in the Vale FC’s heady start to the season came to  an end at the hands of Steventon Sports who by virtue of their 4-2 victory are the early season leaders of the Premier whilst Stanford retain their place at the top of the A section.

There was a good smattering of individual scores again last week with double figure contributions from Jono Worrell in Abingdon United’s narrow 4-2 defeat by the Abingdon Arms A side, Mark Jones hit double figures for Berinsfield A, and Andy Phipps, Billy Collett, Steve Fisher, John Allnutt all contributed with double figures as highest individual scorers for their teams. It is really encouraging to see so many different players from hitting the what seems to some of us the dizzy heights of double figures from each of the sections.

Early Pacesetters in each of the sections (it is early days, I know) are Fleur de Leys, Hagbourne in the B section, Boundary House and Grapes A in the C section, Bystander B in Section D, Prince of Wales, Shippon in Section E and The Wheatsheaf Didcot in Section F.

Surprisingly after only 3 weeks there is no team in any of the sections with a 100% record in terms of points although a number of teams have yet to lose a match, but all teams have lost or drawn at least one leg!

Next week’s review will concentrate on some of the scores, players  and results from Sections B, C and D.

Would secretaries and team captains look out for an e mail in the next day or so regarding the forthcoming Competitions to be held at Abingdon United on June 21st………….we need more entries to make these competitions work for everyone and at the moment it is not looking good in terms of numbers!