Author Archive | Roger Nichols

Firstly let’s start with the results from last week and there was a lot of good scoring in all sections as we complete week 12 which means two thirds of the league season is now behind us, but as there are still 6 matches remaining for most sides it’s still all to play for in terms of league and section winners and runners up and for some sides how to avoid the dreaded wooden spoon!

In the Premier section Abingdon United and Plum Pudding are still going head to head with Croft Nomads hanging on their tails and having played each other twice it’s all about their respective results in their remaining fixtures so it is still up for grabs with United and Plum playing Croft in the next couple of weeks. United look favourites at the moment, but Plum will chase them all the way and last week Phil Adams was the top doll scorer hitting 15 dolls his best of the season including a first leg 6, there was also a long awaited and welcome return to form for Dave Butler who hit 11 , his first double figure score of the season.

Abingdon United though were also in fine form with Alec Chamberlain hitting 13 dolls and Dave Dix and Scott Humphries 12 apiece in their win at the Red Lion.

Elsewhere in the Premier/A section Croft were a little fortunate to escape with a 3-3 result at the C0llege Oak who only needed 2 dolls from Paul Kelsey their anchor with the final throw of thee 3rd leg for a 4-2 win,, but unfortunately (or fortunately for The Croft) he only managed 1 to level the leg. College with a few regulars missing hit a credible 21 dolls in the second leg which with their handicap gave them a leg score of 26 easily their best of the season.

Prince of Wales Veterans secured their first 6-0 victory of the season against The Hart Harwell and there was a welcome double figure return from Dave Hudson and another 10 from the consistent  Jumbo Mott. 

Overall there were 18 individual scores of 10 or better including a first of the season 6 for Dave Sapey in his 13 dolls for Abingdon RBL and although not hitting double figures last week Steve Enock became the 8th player to pass 100 dolls for the season so far.

Determining handicaps and who plays in which section

Now, it’s probably time to try to explain how the handicap system in the Premier and A sections established are  and indeed how the whole section composition is determined at the start of the season. Firstly the intent of both is to try to make each of the sections as competitive as possible so sides have a reasonable opportunity every time they play and it is all based on previous “form” of the registered players from the previous year (this year it had to be based on 2019!). The top 8 players from thos registered is added together and then a handicap set for all of the teams which make the respective average scores competitive.

The handicap assumes that the top 8 regular players continue to score similarly in the following season and those with lowest aggregate scores are given the maximum handicap against those with the highest to make each of the legs competitive and hopefully more enjoyable  and challenging for both sides.

The other sections are determined in the same way although this can be more difficult as more players who are new to the game cannot be included in the top 8 from the previous season. But overall we try to achieve the same objective sometimes it works well, sometimes not so well and that is mostly determined by some individuals registered, but not playing regularly, losing form, not playing at all or suddenly hitting a lot more dolls than they have previously did! There are, lots of evidence of these this year and a couple are identifiable in last weeks results.

It will always be a bone of contention, but it seems the best way to try to make games as competitive as possible.

Out of interest after 12 games this season in the Premier/A sections on total doll count the league order would look like this (based solely on dolls scored and with all handicap dolls removed.

Premier                                                             A Section

1. Abingdon United         814                 Berinsfield        611
2. Plum Pudding               765                 The Vine           514
3. 3. Croft Nomads           629                 Red Lion           487         
4. POW Veterans              597                  College Oak      487
5. SSSC                               579                   The Hart           463

In reality the difference in dolls scored each leg  at this stage of the season between the top team in the Premier and the bottom side in the A section is over 10.5 dolls per leg, that’s why we need and have a handicap system. We haven’t and will not get it right every time and this year was more difficult as we hadn’t played for 2 years, teams have disappeared, players have moved between teams  but probably without a handicap system in place we would struggle to have anything other than a “super league” with the top 2 sides playing each other every week!

Based on the team results so far this season next year there would be minimal change next year to the composition of both the Premier and A Sections with only 2 or 3 sides outside of the current Premier/A sections scoring collectively more dolls than the current Premier/A sections!

To show we do get some things right…… in the B section after 12 weeks there is only a 47 doll difference in dolls scored between the side at the top and the side currently at the bottom of the section!

So for those sides who average over 20 dolls leg playing sides who average 12 or 13 dolls per leg that’s why we give them a 4 or 5 doll advantage per leg.

Sorry if this sound like a whinge, it’s not meant to but it is intended to explain how and why the sections are constructed and handicaps are determined.

Have a good night everyone!

Another week into our season and another warm and sunny Wednesday evening,, the weather has over the past couple of weeks has seemingly recognised that Aunt Sally is an outdoor game made even more enjoyable when it’s warm and dry!

So to the highlights of last week’s team and individual performances and also 1 or 2 interesting or not so interesting facts!

Firstly let’s start with the Premier and A section, comprehensive 6-0 victories for the top 3 sides in the Premier and, believe it or not in Abingdon United’s victory over The Vine Dave Dix was not the highest doll scorer, he was outscored by his teammate Alec Chamberlain who scored 14 (5.4.5) whereas Dave only managed to hit 13 and Leigh Clapton also hit 13 dolls. A tough night for the Vine meeting Abingdon United on peak form! Elsewhere Plum Pudding beat The Hart Harwell 6-0, Barry Townsend top scoring with 11 dolls ably supported by Phil Adams and Ken Fisher with 10 apiece. Croft Nomads also turned in a 6-0 win to avenge their early season defeat by Red Lion A and Steve Enock hit his first 6 of the season and the only one of the night, top scoring with 13 dolls for the Nomads. Alan Bell hit 9 dolls to join the “100 up” club and he was joined last week By Jumbo Mott of the Prince of Wales veterans and Alec Chamberlain of Abingdon United so 6 players have now hit over a 100 dolls led by Dixie with his 121 coming from only 9 matches with several more hoping to cross that line tonight!

Lots of double figurescores  for individuals last week in all sections, too many to mention in full, but special mention to  Adie Kingsbury from the Chequers, Maurice Owen, of  Abingdon United C and Barry Sutton of Hanney RBL, Nathan Hamilton playing for SIVFC and Danny McArdle of the Grapes B who all recorded their first double figures of the season.

In the B section leaders Stanford in the Vale FC were beaten 4-2,  by the Royal Oak, but still retain a healthy 12 point lead at the top of the table. The closest battle at the top is definitely in E section where both The Plough Hanney and The Midget are locked on 40 points apiece and with only 6 dolls between them.

An interesting feature of note, Berinsfield A have 6 players  out of the top 10 doll averages in the  A section, which shows their consistency and  strength in depth.

Special mention of 4 players 2 from the B section and 2 from D section whose doll average at the moment would put them in the top 10 in the Premier doll table, that’s Steve Taylor and Dave Collett playing in the B section  and Andrew Shipman and Rick Selby who are both playing in the D section for Harwellian B and College Oak B respectively! Keep up that level of scoring and the head hunters will be out for you in 2023!

Good luck to everyone tonight!

Well, after a couple of weeks without any 6’s being recorded, last week’s fine weather did the trick for some. Headlines this week go to an Abingdon United player, no not Dave Dix, but more about him later this week it is Michael (Moffy) James of Abingdon United C who recorded a magnificent first leg 6 in thie C section clash with The Grapes, a tremendous achievement Moffy!

So I guess it’s back to Dave Dix and yes, he did hit a 6 in his 15 dolls against Plum Pudding in the top clash in the Premier which United won 4-2. Dixie was ably supported by 13 dolls from Alex Chamberlain and 12 dolls from Scott Humphries.

For Plum Pudding 5 players hit double figures topping including Ken Fisher who scored the other 6 hit on the night in his 11.

To cap Abingdon United’s successful  night they then went on to secure their semi final place in the 8’s competition by defeating the Plum 2-0  in their second round clash. They will now play The Vine next month in the semi final of this competition.

Elsewhere in the Premier Section Croft Nomads had 3 players in double figures including Titch Bell with 14 his best of the season to date as they defeated Berinsfield 4-2 in a repeat of the result between the 2 sides on the first day of the season.

Week 10 also saw the first 3 players to pass 100 dolls for the season led inevitably by Dave Dix who has hit an incredible 119 dolls in only 8 appearances, Phil Adams has hit 102 and his Plum Pudding team mate Paul Longford  has hit 101 in pursuit of Dave.  They and all of the other hopefuls chasing the top doll score  will have to hope that he gets tickets for another one or two Wednesday night concerts before the end of the season!

The commentator’s curse obviously affected Harwellian B last week because they lost their first game of the season in the D section  against Abingdon Arms B. That’s the last of the unbeaten records gone at the halfway stage.

Finally an apology from me for last week’s cock up with the match scores that affected some of you. Entirely my fault as I didn’t update the week number before Wednesday evening which mean that the early scores recorded by the most on the ball teams wnt in as week 9 scores overriding the correct week 9 scores. All good now with a bit of rework and the help of a valuable and competent friend, Paul Stone! Thanks to Dave Davies for the alert which prevented it being  a bigger problem even if it meant me logging in after a few beers at 11.45pm. No problems this week as week 11 scores are ready to load!

We  have received no further entries for Competitions so watch this space for further news over the next week or so and remember entries will continue to be accepted until the end of this week for all comps and the forms are still available on line.

Enjoy tonight and hopefully we won’t have any weather postponements which might have been a risk had we been playing on Monday or Tuesday this week!

Thanks to a editorial error (me) a few early match scores from last night were posted to week 9 and this meant that they overrode the correct scores for week 9. This obviously affected team scores and results, individual player scores and league tables.  The correct week 10 scores have now been added, but the week 9 scores for those teams affected are wrong.

We will seek to put the right scores in for week 9, but it may take a day or so to put right. It seems that it potentially only affects matches played between 12 teams last week so bear with us as we make the necessary changes which hopefully will have been made by the end of the weekend.

Sorry, can’t blame the website this time just my incompetence!

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Well tonight we start the second half of our season with the reverse fixtures from the opening week back in May. The start of the season was a bit of a concern with less teams entered, lots of uncertainty about sides having enough players week in and week out and worries that enthusiasm for our game would have been lost after a 2 year absence. Thankfully though a lot of those concerns have so far not presented too many issues, but the holiday season is approaching and that will provide additional challenges for many teams with players taking time out for their family holidays.

The Committee have tried top be flexible by registering additional players without the usual late registration fee and 1 week “waiting time” before being allowed to play and we will continue that until the end of the season for all teams in sections B, C and D. Teams in the Premier and A can also add players, providing that they don’t affect the already established handicaps for teams in those sections. Our objective is to help all sides field a full side every week.

The first half of the season saw over 200 games played across the leagues with only 4 scheduled games not taking place, that’s brilliant and thanks to everyone for making the effort both in fulfilling their fixtures and, in many cases, recruiting new  (and returning) players to our game.

Week 9 unusually was another week without any 6’s being recorded in any section. Having said that there was still some excellent scoring throughout the sections led again by Abingdon United’s Dave Dix who hit 14 dolls for the 5th time this year (in his other 2 games he only hit 13!) He is in crazy form,. This week he was matched with 14 dolls by Steventon Sports, Ian Morrison for his best haul of the season.

Elsewhere there were lots of double figure counts and special mention to Robert Glen for Stanford in the Vale FC who hit 13 dolls in their game against the Fleur de Leys.

I promised a quick review of the League tables at the halfway stage and generally things are very tight at the top! In the Premier section unsurprisingly Abingdon United and Plum Pudding are closely contesting the top spot followed closely by Croft Nomads with, at this stage, only 3 points separating the 3 sides. In the A section only  2 points separate the top 3 who are The Vine, Berinsfield and Red Lion A so all to play for there.

In B section Stanford in the Vale FC lead the way closely pursued by their near neighbours from Denchworth,The Fox .

Section C is led by the Red Lion C with the Boundary House in pursuit just 4 points behind. Section D sees the only remaining team Harwellian B 11 points clear of Berinsfield B and it looks like they are looking likely champions even with half a season to go! 

In Section E again it’s a close run thing at the moment with The Plough Hanney leading the way one point ahead of The Midget with all to play for in  the second half of the season.

I mentioned last week that Caroline Baker playing for the Red Lion B deserves a special mention not only because she has already hit a 6 this season (is she the first ever lady to do this in our league?) , but also after 9 games she features in the Top 10 doll scorers in the D section with some very consistent scoring every week. 

Finally this week a couple of reminders and a warning to a few!

The Competitions are all set for Sunday August 21st with a 1pm start at Abingdon United. We have a good crop of entries but would like more especially from teams and individuals outside of the Premier and A sections who traditionally dominate tjhe entries. Give it a go! We are going to accept entries up until the 6th August and we want to make it both a serious and a fun day and perhaps include a couple of “open” Competitions for all registered and non registered players, (maybe ladies and under 21’s) on the day. More about that nearer the time!

And the warning, we need to collect some remaining registration fees and competition entry fees over the next few weeks so don’t be surprised if a very reasonable demand for payment arrives in your inbox!

Have a good night and enjoy this unusual Aunt Sally good weather!

Well tonight is week 9 and that means that after tonight’s fixtures we are halfway through our season and next week we will review the season so far and look at how the league tables are shaping up with some highlights and maybe some lowlights across the 5 sections.

But first, let’s look at last weeks results and performances. We tend to look at the highest doll scorers, best team performances, but the game is more than that for many, it’s a night out, it’s good fun, it’s custom and much needed income for our pubs and clubs, and  for many  of us it is a bloody frustrating game!

Last week leading the individual doll count was once again Dave Dix of Abingdon United and this week he was equalled with his 13 dolls by Phil Adams of the Plum Pudding. Not surprisingly as these two sides are looking to go ahead for the Premier section top spot they were well supported by their team mates 5 of whom hit double figures, 3 for United and 2  for Plum Pudding. Incidentally Dixey is now averaging Dixey’s 4.83 dolls a leg, and that,  in our sport must rank as world class!

Elsewhere in the Premier/A section there was a very welcome, and somewhat surprising first win of the season for College Oak A who defeated Berinsfield A  and both Paul Kelsey and Kevin Chapman contributed with 10 dolls apiece to their success whilst Malcolm Jones hit 11 for Berinsfield. 

There was a good number of individual double figures all round last week with 5 being recorded in the B section, 3 in the C section and 1 in each of the D and E sections. Well done to all of you, that’s good scoring from you all

Surprisingly there were no sixers last week, but that doesn’t mean that the scoring all round wasn’t good although as always there were some exceptions and I can vouch for that from personal experience!

Just a few other things to mention. High flying Red Lion C previously unbeaten had a shock losing all 3 legs at The Bell Grove, Harwellian B are therefore  the only remaining side not to suffer a defeat so far this season in all of the sections. On the downside both Feathers Flyers from the Prince of Wales Shippon and North Star B are still seeking their first wins.

Just looking at the current top doll scorers it is no surprise that in the Premier players from the Plum Pudding and Abingdon United have 4 apiece in the Premier top 10 and despite last week’s defeat Berinsfield A have 6 of their players in the top 10 in the A section!

However, whist we always look towards the leading teams next week we will focus on each of the sections and look at those teams who won’t always feature in the top sections nor the highest doll scorers, but whom play week in and week out,  who introduce new players to the game and play purely for enjoyment and most of all contribute to the ongoing success and spirit of our game. After all no-one in any sport whether it be Football, Golf or Aunt Sally want to be part of a “super league” where only the best play and then end up with so few sides/competitors who then have to play each other almost every other week because everyone else can’t compete at the highest level!

A final note for this week……………..don’t forget entries  for 2022 Competitions close this weekend so if you want to play then get your forms in please………..and looking at our Top 10 doll scorers in  in each of the sections how good is it to see a female featuring! More about that next week!

Enjoy your evening.

2022 Competitions

Just a reminder that 2022 Competition forms are now available online. Competition for the Team 5’s, 4’s, 3’s and for the Pairs, Singles, Captains and Secretaries championship.

All Competitions will take place at one Venue (Abingdon United on the afternoon of Sunday August 21st with the Finals being held on the evening of Friday 21st September.

Entry fees are £1 per player in each of the Competitions entered and entry forms can be logged online using the Team Support e mail link or alternatively to any of your Committee members.

Entries have already been received from several clubs this season  and also entry forms registered in the aborted 2020 seasons are still valid and we will be contacting those teams with the detail of their entries. 

CLOSING DATE FOR ENTRIES IS SUNDAY  10th JULY