Competitive play is about testing yourself against others, and the stronger the other players, the greater the test. On 30th September, Generation 2 club members Mike Cooksley, Danny Lucking and Gareth Scaddan were joined by guest player Paul May to kick off the first weekend of high-level competitive play at Cippenham in Division C of the Senior British League.

On the Saturday morning Generation lost out 8-1 to Bristol Associates. Scaddan took the only win, but many of the other matches were close – with several going the distance to 5 sets. On a different day, the final score could have been very different. In the afternoon, the veteran team took on Joola Plymouth 2 – a team made up of top level (UKCC level 4) coach Paul Whiting, and a selection of his up-and-coming junior players. Unfortunately in this case youth trumped experience and the result was again an 8-1 defeat, with Scaddan managing the only win in a close game with Joola Plymouth 2’s number 4.

On the Sunday the Generation 2 lineup changed slightly to replace Scaddan with the younger but still experienced Callum Shipp, playing as number 1, allowing Paul and Mike to take on (slightly!) less challenging opponents. Unfortunately the competition, Horsham Spinners 3 and Cippenham 2 (two of the top three teams in the league based on current results) proved too strong, with Generation suffering 9-0 defeats both morning and afternoon. Again though, the final scores don’t reflect some of the individual performances, with many of the matches going to 4 or 5 sets.

The next British league weekend is 25th/26th November, where the team will look to improve on this first weekend’s performance.