Recently, 3 school teams from Gosforth, Ponteland and Cramlington competed in Milton Keynes in the National Finals of the National Schools Badminton Championships. Here is how they fared:
Coach Phil Hall wrote about the performance of the Ponteland boys who played extremely well, and had they won two of the matches they only just lost 2-3, could have finished a few places higher.
The Ponteland High KS3 boys team of Ollie Edmondson, Jack Tilbury, Hugh Twelves and Jamie Grant competed at the highest level on Sunday 5th May in the National Finals of the National Schools Badminton Championships at Badminton England’s headquarters in Milton Keynes. After winning both area and regional rounds they all put in excellent performances against four other schools to finish 8th out of the 9 regional winners.
In the first morning match, wins from Ollie Edmondson and then the Hugh Twelves/Jamie Grant combination provided an excellent start, however three losses followed including one at 21 – 20. This meant a 3 – 2 loss to Newbridge High School, the only other HS left in the competition.
Next up was The Webber Independent School for Badminton who won the event last year and were the eventual winners this time. This resulted in a 5 nil loss but the team competed well particularly in the three doubles matches.
In the afternoon (7/8/9 play off’s) the first match was against Wilson’s School. From 2 nil down, the team came back to win 3 – 2 due to Jack winning singles, followed by Ollie/Jamie then Jack/Hugh in doubles.
The final match was versus Chulmleigh Community College from Devon. Here the team were oncemore 2 nil down, brought it back to 2 – 2 but lost the fifth. Within the 3 – 2 loss, 3 games went to 21 – 20 which typified the day, tight gruelling matches, long rallies, overall an excellent level of badminton.
Over the day all of the boys won some, lost some, puts loads of effort in and never folded. They are a credit to the school and everyone who has helped them reach this level. Hopefully they all stick together for the school and the county over the next few years.
The KS3 Girls team from Cramlington Learning Village ended up in 9th place (out of 9 teams). This was a young, inexperienced team, but coach Tony Fowler commented “a wonderful experience for our girls. We came 9th out of 9, but we mixed it with the best and gave our best without any heads going down”. The girls will have learnt a lot from these Finals.
The highest placed team was the KS4 Boys team from Gosforth Academy. They finished up in 6th place (out of 9 teams). The PE teacher who accompanied the boys, wrote that the boys played well to achieve a higher placing than last year, “but there’s still a big gap between us and the top teams”.