IOMSRA Squash league resumes after the lockdown
Squash is back after the enforced lockdown break. The B league match on Monday night brought together the Island Tyres & Exhausts and the Junior Academy team. On this occasion experience won the day with Exhausts winning 3-2. Merseyside veteran player Peter Sharples took on Isaac Quayle, a player about a quarter of his age. He used all his experience to win the pressure points and take the match 3-0. On the opposite court Liam Townsend took on the in-form Island ladies player Emma Leith. Leith’s good run of form continued as she won the match in 3 close games. Magnus Lamprecht battled with Emma’s younger brother Ben in the middle string match with Magnus proving a little bit too strong for his youthful opponent, winning 3-1. The second string match saw Shaun Wyllie, the player of the season, come up against Harvey Douglas, the Junior player of the season. This was tremendous match with Wylie eventually winning the fourth game 15-10 to win by a score of 3-1. Finally the number one players took to the court, Steve Baker and Junior number 1 Ben Peach. They are currently ranked at number 13 and 15 on the IOM squash levels and the match was as close as these rankings would predict, going all the way to five games, with Ben’s youth eventually making the difference as he took the final two games to clinch the match.
The Racketeers Pioneers showed no sign of rust as they emerged from the lockdown break to score a near-maximum win over B League Dragons on Monday evening. Pioneers triumphed 246/187 4-1 thanks to wins for Barry Irvine, James Leith, skipper Marc Taggart and number one Daf Lewis. The latter triumphed in an arm-wrestle of a match with James Martin with two games going to 15/14 in Lewis’s 3-1 victory. Dragons were competitive though, with Leith the only Pioneer to keep a clean sheet in his 3-0 triumph over Dragons’ captain Darren Smethurst. Securing their only win on the night was number two Dave Hedley, who came from two games down to ensure Rob Boyles’s much-hyped return to court ended in a 3-2 defeat.
The picture shows players from the match between the Island Tyres & Exhausts and Junior Academy teams. Back row left to right – Harvey Douglas, Ben Peach, Pat Fitzpatrick (Junior Academy coach), Shaun Wyllie and Peter Sharples. Front row left to right – Emma Leith, Ben Leith, Steve Baker, Magnus Lamprecht and Liam Townsend