Chetwood Trophy 2016
The Cup Winners' Cup moved to Bridport this year as each club's handicap winners descended to Dorset to see who would be crowned the 'National Handicap Champion'.
Within two balls of knocking up both resident professionals at the Hyde had openly declared a certain Huw Thomas from Seacourt Tennis Club the winner. What remained was a battle for second place.
Even so, the tournament was a fun one and was enjoyed by all. There were handicaps ranging from 24 all the way through to 70, with some great close results and a fair amount of rock/paper/scissors as people tried to gauge each other through the group stages.
As is often the way there remained two younger players in the final: Jamie Day (Hyde), who had lost a match in the group stages, but was coming on strong in the final day and Huw Thomas himself who had dispatched most people until a slightly nervy semi-final against Nick Abelson who had been playing out of his skin all day.
The final was over quite quickly (8/2 at the end of a very long day), but was well contested.
Huw managed to get his handicap down from 55 to 50 over the course of the weekend and should be congratulated for having an impressive maturity to his game in the face of so many different play styles. Yet again a great example of Seacourt churning out youngsters for the future of our game. Well done Huw!
Jamie Day and Huw Thomas