Oxford 47 - 43 Cambridge
Report by Hugh Lund
The 2012 Men's Varsity Match took place over the weekend of the 5th and 6th May, at Riley's in Oxford. Anyone casually strolling into the snooker club expecting to see a feast of flair, top-class positional play and nerveless potting was not to be disappointed: the snooker was being shown on tv, and Ronnie was playing. Despite this, there was a match to be played, with the final outcome as uncertain as ever. After agreeing a 12pm start time with the foolish Oxford captain, the Cambridge team then turned anytime from 11am to 3pm, confusing their opposition and making the whole competition a pain to organise.
Once the first set of singles started, it soon became apparent that turning up 10 minutes before you're due to play is not conducive to good pool: Cambridge were soon behind, losing 5 of the first 6 matches. Only debutant Anthony Dinatale achieved victory, beating Oxford captain and Gwilym Entstone 2-1. A recovery towards the end ensured respectability, with notable 3-0 victories for Johnians Tom and, er... Jon, but left Cambridge with a mountain to climb. Score: 21 - 15
As stated in last year's report, doubles has traditionally been a strength of Oxford. This, however, is no longer the case, as Cambridge were excellent through-out, winning 4 out of 6 matches and making several Oxford players cry. Score: 29 - 25
The 'Sunday Singles' in fact began on Saturday, with Peterborough wideboy Anthony "the Don" Dinatale facing off against Alec Graham that evening so he could get home and pretend to be really hard with his mates. He was, however, made to look like a little girl on the table, losing 2-1. The matches continued to go Oxford's way on the Sunday, as they won the first five matches 2-1. Cambridge recovered to win six of the next seven, but it was to prove too little too late as Oxford crept over the line once again. Amusingly though, Rik O'Connor lived up to his nickname as "The Seedkiller" by destroying Oxford captain Gwilym Entstone 2-1, with the match being described by various onlookers as "a humiliation", "utter destruction" and "really funny". Score: 47 - 43
This was, yet again, a disappointing result from Cambridge's point of view. The Oxford team we faced was, in the main, inexperienced and one building for the future. However, yet again it was the first session of singles that really let us down, creating an obstacle that was too much to overcome. Nevertheless, it was generally agreed to be an excellent performance by all present, and with a bit more luck the result could have been very different. However, most of this team will be back next year, when the match will be played on home turf, under our rules. Bring on 2013. Revenge will be ours. Really, I mean it this time.
| FULL RESULTS | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Oxford | Cambridge | ||||||
| Saturday singles 21-15 |
3 | Ben Charlston | 3 | v | 0 | James Wilkinson | 0 |
| 5 | Ricky Walters | 2 | v | 1 | Pete Atkinson | 1 | |
| 6 | Gwilym Entstone | 1 | v | 2 | Anthony Dinatale | 3 | |
| 9 | Dale Rout | 3 | v | 0 | Rik O'Connor | 3 | |
| 11 | Matt Kennedy | 2 | v | 1 | Yunqing Guan | 4 | |
| 14 | Alec Graham | 3 | v | 0 | Steve Herbert | 4 | |
| 14 | Dan Hayes | 0 | v | 3 | Tom Sutton | 7 | |
| 14 | Ian Pethick | 0 | v | 3 | Jon Nelson | 10 | |
| 15 | Russell Smith | 1 | v | 2 | Paul Thomas | 12 | |
| 18 | Joe Bryan | 3 | v | 0 | James Palmer | 12 | |
| 20 | Lee Collins | 2 | v | 1 | Hugh Lund | 13 | |
| 21 | Martin Henstridge | 1 | v | 2 | Drew Miley | 15 | |
| Saturday doubles 8-10 |
23 | Gwilym and Joe | 2 | v | 1 | Anthony and James P | 16 |
| 24 | Lee and Ricky | 1 | v | 2 | Jon and Tom | 18 | |
| 24 | Dale and Alec | 0 | v | 3 | Pete and James W | 21 | |
| 27 | Russell and Ian | 3 | v | 0 | Steve and Rik | 21 | |
| 28 | Ben and Dan | 1 | v | 2 | Hugh and Guan | 23 | |
| 29 | Martin and Matt | 1 | v | 2 | Drew and Paul | 25 | |
| Sunday singles 18-18 |
31 | Alec Graham | 2 | v | 1 | Anthony Dinatale | 26 |
| 33 | Joe Bryan | 2 | v | 1 | Yunqing Guan | 27 | |
| 35 | Ricky Walters | 2 | v | 1 | Steve Herbert | 28 | |
| 37 | Russell Smith | 2 | v | 1 | Jon Nelson | 29 | |
| 39 | Dan Hayes | 2 | v | 1 | Pete Atkinson | 30 | |
| 40 | Matt Kennedy | 1 | v | 2 | Paul Thomas | 32 | |
| 40 | Ian Pethick | 0 | v | 3 | Hugh Lund | 35 | |
| 41 | Martin Henstridge | 1 | v | 2 | Drew Miley | 37 | |
| 42 | Dale Rout | 1 | v | 2 | Tom Sutton | 39 | |
| 43 | Lee Collins | 1 | v | 2 | James Palmer | 41 | |
| 46 | Ben Charlston | 3 | v | 0 | James Wilkinson | 41 | |
| 47 | Gwilym Entstone | 1 | v | 2 | Rik O'Connor | 43 | |
| 47 | v | 43 | |||||
While there were several players who finished joint second in the stats on 6 out of 9, it was St John's Tom Sutton who came top, winning 5 out of 6 singles and 2 out of 3 doubles. Special mention must go to doubles specialist James Wilkinson, who had the dubious privilege of player Oxford's star player and BUCS number 4 seed Ben Charlston twice in the singles!
Seperate from the team event was a singles competition, which fittingly ended with the Oxford and Cambridge captains meeting in the final, with Gwilym overcoming Hugh by 4 frames to 1.
| INDIVIDUAL STATS | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Name | Singles (out of 6) | Doubles (out of 3) | Overall (out of 9) | Doubles Adjusted (out of 7.5) | ||||
| Won | % won | Won | % won | Won | % won | Won | % won | |
| Tom Sutton | 5 | 83 | 2 | 67 | 7 | 78 | 6 | 80 |
| Hugh Lund (c) | 4 | 67 | 2 | 67 | 6 | 67 | 5 | 67 |
| Drew Miley | 4 | 67 | 2 | 67 | 6 | 67 | 5 | 67 |
| Jon Nelson | 4 | 67 | 2 | 67 | 6 | 67 | 5 | 67 |
| Paul Thomas | 4 | 67 | 2 | 67 | 6 | 67 | 5 | 67 |
| Pete Atkinson | 2 | 33 | 3 | 100 | 5 | 56 | 3.5 | 47 |
| Anthony Dinatale | 3 | 50 | 1 | 33 | 4 | 44 | 3.5 | 47 |
| Yunqing Guan | 2 | 33 | 2 | 67 | 4 | 44 | 3 | 40 |
| James Palmer | 2 | 33 | 1 | 33 | 3 | 33 | 2.5 | 33 |
| James Wilkinson | 0 | 0 | 3 | 100 | 3 | 33 | 1.5 | 20 |
| Rik O'Connor | 2 | 33 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 22 | 2 | 27 |
| Steve Herbert | 1 | 17 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 11 | 1 | 13 |
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