The teams currently at the top of Division One of the Leicester & District League had a very positive time in the latest batch of results with two full houses and one at 9-1, and that one a doubles loss.
Defending champions, Unicorn, won all nine singles against Arnesby in a 9-1 win with Jared Patel, Lois Peake and Tim Sheppard unbeaten, although England-ranked Peake was taken to five by Ian Brown. Arnesby did take a surprise doubles.
Knighton Park are the other so far unbeaten team, securing a powerful looking 10-0 against Syston Casuals thanks to Karen Smith, Chris Rogers and Reza Kiani. Electricity, in third position, also recorded a 10-0 against Holwell Sports with Matt Hobday, Andy LeButt and David Grundy in good form.
Ajax Wolvey, third last term, are still recovering from a first-match defeat, this time beating Abbots Road 7-3 for whom Dave Gannon maintained his unbeaten tag with a great maximum. Ajax then just overcame Arnesby 6-4 when Jon Williams won three, John Fuller two and these two took the all-important doubles. Arnesby battled away with Ian Brown winning two, Darren Bramhall and Steve Silk one apiece – Silk losing his other two in five games each time.
Malcolm Truman scored a match winning maximum for Desford Village against Knighton Park’s second team and received good support from Tony Smith (2) and Neil Matthams (1) and then the doubles in a 7-3 success. For KP, George McClurkin won two, Jack Rogers one.
Division Two is moving along very much as expected with all 12 teams looking very closely competitive before the start, and so it has proved. Every team has now lost at least one match in a promotion tussle that is likely to involve the majority of teams for longer than normal.
Top at the moment are Knighton Park V, four players coming together for the first time, with Lucky Obi taking three against Great Glen in an 8-2 win, Dean Jordan and Rod Pickering two apiece as they both lost to Alex Mason who went down 12-10 in the fifth to Obi. KP captain, John Underwood, missed this one.
Nearest challengers, who look very strong in depth, are Unicorn, who beat Regent Sports 7-3 for whom Martin Bolton won two. John Genovese was unbeatable for the students and just got the better of Bolton at deuce in the fifth and was backed by two each from Ben Stone and Jianglong Guo.
Regent Sports bounced half way back against Nomads in a tough 5-5 draw when Kevin Sanderson and Charlie Bateman both scored two and the doubles. For Nomads, Andy Searle and Zaheer Mohamed grabbed two each, Cliff Smith one.
Sam Radenhurst came away from Desford Village with a great maximum for Electricity III in their 6-4 success, backed by two from Russell Pettitt and these two combined to take full points with a doubles win. Kevin Parker was Desford’s most successful player with two.
Two juniors spearheaded Knighton Park IV’s 9-1 victory over Blaby and Whetstone when Rayan Kotecha and Oscar White emerged undefeated. Their coach, Shirley Pickering who doesn’t play in the league that often, supported with a very useful brace.
Some excellent maximums across the other divisions included one by Knighton Park VII’s Simon Aldis who helped his team to a 5-5 draw in Division Three against Syston Casuals III. In the same division Bruce Johnson’s max could not prevent a 6-4 defeat for Leicester Taxes against Knighton’s eighth team.
Guan Mei Zhang won three in Division Five for Unicorn III against Syston Casuals IV, but in vain as the latter won 6-4. Dave Rana took three for Abbots Road IV in helping his team to a 5-5 draw with Knighton Park XI, while Tony Burns’ three spearheaded a Desford Village 6-4 victory against Nomads V.
The standout maximum in Division Four was from Luke Blair, who came out of his match unscathed as his team, Desford Village III, drew with Electricity V.