Manchester visited for a Club match on Sunday and will be back in the form of their National League Elite/Premier Division team to take on our very own Ed Kay and Jamie Giddins. This is Cambridge’s last home match of the season so please come along to the Club and support if you possibly can!

Sunday’s match was a highly entertaining affair with excellent tennis, lunch and banter. The match ended 5-2 in CURTC’s favour but was much closer than that. Karen Pearce got the Home team off to a good start in a match of contrasting physiques! To be honest it was the only one sided match of the day. MRTC match manager Carl Hamill won a thriller against Howard Mason who came back from two 3rd set 40 – owe 15 deficits to stay alive before agonisingly losing 6-5. The Prof added his chilli to the lunch mix and was equally on fire on Court, a match I did not see as I was on my way to winning the first 7 games against John Mortimer on Green. Suddenly the wind changed and I was 5-2 down, stuck at the Hazard end and facing a barrage of Grille shots. But I finally got a chase and managed to claw my way back.

Meanwhile Jimmy the Beard was proving to be the perfect host by letting Glen Maxwell win the 1st set quickly and easily but again there was a not so subtle wind shift and The Beard went on a roll with some great defence on both sides of the net. Eve Shenkman (the Oxford Ladies #2) proved too good and experienced for our last minute stand-in Freddy Crofts (thanks Freddy!). Continuing our recruitment efforts we spent some time in pointing out the advantages of post graduate study in Cambridge to Eve… Alex Evans was last up against Daddy (Simon) Shenkman. Again the match looked like an easy one for the Home team from the score but it was not! In the end Alex proved just that bit more consistent. We look forward to the return next year in Manchester (a must visit Club, BTW).