News

It's been a mixed couple of weeks for the Men's 6th team...

A good team performance at Lee on Solent saw us pick up 17 points with a 3-2 win against a decent Lee team.  There were convincing victories for Ian Garnham, Allan Hawkey and John Titchener.  Trevor Leahy lost 3-2, but battled hard and did well to pull back two games from 2-0 down to former Winchester player Emily Heyes.
Then last Sunday evening, the strategically timed fire alarm at Five Rivers just before the start of the match put us off our stride against our promotion rivals (the fire engine never did turn up!).  We lost 4-1, with the only highlight of the evening being a solid 3-0 win by Tim Cooling at number 2.
That result still leaves us top of the division, but with Five Rivers level on points but with one win fewer.  Both Nuffield Health teams are close behind, and Avenue have 3 games in hand so could still mount a challenge.  So it's going to be a tight race for promotion which could go down to the wire.

report from Allan Hawkey

The club is hosting an intercounties squash match and a Hampshire girls training  squad this weekend and as a result court availability will be reduced. On Saturday two courts will still be available for members throughout the day while on Sunday there are no courts available between 10:30am and 3pm.

The squash committee assessed and approved the hosting of the events based on review of court usage at weekends. There is still lots of opportunity to play on both days and members' cooperation is appreciated.

It was a big win over St Georges Hill last Tuesday for IGT Winchester in front of a full house. With the world number three, Gregory Gaultier living up to his billing, it proved to be a great night at the Club.

Read the full report here

Tickets are now available for our next home match on Tuesday 31st March against Exeter Diamonds.

Mens 6th team go 3 points clear at the top of their division.

Following a 4-1 (17-5) win against Wykeham and as a result of Nuffield Health dropping 6 points in their first match since Christmas, our 6th team are now clear at the top of their division. Well Done to the team for good all round performances and special mention to Patrick Fisher playing at number one.

Winchester 6th go equal top of league..... Despite losing a tight match 3-2 away at Nuffield Health, our 6th team captained by Allan Hawkey reached equal top by picking up 10 points and restricting their opponents to 16 points. The loss came despite a commanding performance from Scott Finlayson at number one  (won 3-0) and an excellent battling 3-2 win by number two Tim Cooling.

Read more...

Winchester 6th team going strong…

Following a clinical win over Southampton University 5-0 last week gaining 20 points in the league, our 6th team captained by Allan Hawkey overcame Lee on Solent in a closely fought cup match

Good performances throughout saw Winchester win 3-2.  Ian Garnham won a tight match in 5 games, and did well to win it in the end after surrendering a 2-0 lead.  Probably the performance of the night was John Titchener, who came back from 2-0 down to win 3-2 after saving match ball in the 4th game.  Tim Cooling also put up a good fight at  number 1, losing 9-7 in the 5th after coming back from 2-0 down.  So all in all some excellent, competitive and friendly games, and a late finish!

A win at  Nuffield Health 3 this week  would see the team reach Christmas at the top of the table.

Winchester 6     v             Lee on Solent 4
Tim Cooling      2-3          Jonathan Booth
Ian Garnham    3-2          Andrew Notley
Allan Hawkey    3-1          David Parker
John Titchener 3-2          Andy Rolfe
Tim Burn           0-3          Pete Nisbet

Result:  Winchester beat Lee on Solent by 3-2

Some top performances have been recorded by our teams in the past week....

Winchester 5th Beat University 16-8

Winchester Tennis and Squash Club's 5th team had a great win over the University beating them 16 - 8. Chris Scott, Shaun Barriball and Ian Garnham all won at 1,3 & 5 respectively. Trevor Leahy and Tim Cooling lost 3-1 at 2 & 4, making it a successful evening for the odd strings! Chris Scott played superbly winning the deciding tie with a thumping, if noisy display. It was the first game the university number 1 had lost in some time and he was singing Chris's praise. For that reason Chris was player of the night. With only 2 games previously played this brought the team up just 1 point behind the rest of the pack.

thanks to Trevor Leahy for the match report

Winchester 7th Beat Totton 17-4

This Wednesday saw Winchester 7 beat Totton 4 in result that was completely unexpected by either team.  Top-of-the-table Totton started strongly with hard fought and well deserved wins for Mark Mortimer and Ross Shaddick at strings four and five respectively.  Next up for Winchester was Kevin Kilroy who continued his recent run of good results by pulling one back for the home team with a 3-1 win against Steve Raynsford .

This was followed by talented Winchester youngster Jack Payne who played by far his best game of the season to beat Tim Nash 3-1.  At two matches a piece it was perfectly poised as Ian Garnham stepped out for the home team against Totton first string Jon Bull.The packed gallery enjoyed some excellent squash and some punishing rallies as these two evenly matched players battled it out.  Excellent retrieving by Garnham eventually saw him win the match and the tie for Winchester.

Star player: Jack Payne.  Shot of the night: An inch-perfect forehand volley kill by Jon Bull.

Send us your reports or hand in to reception after your match in and we will publish on website and send to the local press

Belgium Junior Squash Open, November 2011

The Elite squad from our Club headed over to The Belgium Junior Open last month.  It is a key event in the junior calendar -not only for being a Super Series Event and as such holding valuable ranking (National and European) points, but also for being the last big tournament where everyone in the world comes together before the pinnacle of the season - The British Junior Open (2nd January 2012). 

As expected it was a very strong tournament, Josh Carter who has just moved up to the under 17 age group drew a top seed from the Ukraine in the first round but gave a good account of himself in a tough 3-0 loss, he then went on to make the semi finals of the plate and played some good squash all the way through.  Tom Kirby unseeded due to lack of European tournaments came though some tough matches and ended up 5th after losing to Emyr Evans form Wales who took 2nd place overall.  Catherine Finalyson showed some good form after recent hard training and took 3rd place after beating both the UK  number 2 and number 5 as well as the German number 1.  It was a very successful trip, all players improved and now have a lot of work ahead of them before the Open at the start of January.

Gary Hinton

Tickets are selling fast for the clubs first home match in this season's Premier Squash League on Tuesday 25 October v Surrey H&R.

Make sure you dont miss out - get your tickets at reception now.

For further PSL info and all related news visit our IGT Winchester PSL web page