FOSS NATION FREE FALL

Boasters League round 5~~

From 4^th to 8^th. Even though Foss Nation did have the bye week and it was expected that they would drop on the standings because of it, they did let themselves down somewhat by picking up only 4 points in makeup matches. Complacency is the perfect recipe for failure, just because your team has the week off from the regular schedule, doesn’t mean that you take the week off from getting on court! Now, Foss Nation needs to play catch-up and that is usually not an easy strategy.

The good news is that the current top four teams on the standings are all yet to have their bye week, so catch-up is certainly possible. However, the top four teams are clearly more active than the rest: they were the top 4 point getters in round 4. And the top 3 teams have accumulated the most bonus points this season as well (so far).

In comparison to the 2015-2016 season after round 4, we are just about on par with how many points overall have been scored, so that is a positive statistic. Although I do think that we could (and should) be beating that number. Based on how popular the league night has become - it was packed in the court area last night - the feeling is more results should have come in. It’s fantastic to see so many people milling around (the keg) on Wednesdays, if only that would translate to the league matches just as much!

Here are some of Wednesday night’s stand-out matches: Andy Adamo (Nicker Ballers) picks up his second win of the season with a 2-1 victory over Jason Currie (Vivio’s) handing him his first loss. Taking nothing away from Andy’s no doubt silky smooth performance, Jason may want to reconsider his pre-match warm up ritual of plastic-cup-arm-raises. Brien Baker (Space Geckos) also notched up his second win this season taking out Bret Williams (Mongoose) with a 2-1, boast-riddled victory! And JB Peabody (Nick at Night) – who has come back from a lengthy squash hiatus to rejoin the fray – scores his first win, taking down Butter Nutz’ Adam Pabarcus 2-1.

As I mentioned above, the crowd was quite considerable last night. It appears that part of the challenge on league night is now how fast can the members kill the keg. It took a mere 2 hours to drag out the empty barrel carcass, which was slightly faster than the effort portrayed on opening night. Still, the bar was kept busy for some time afterwards as well, all the courts were still occupied by the time I left, and by the short video I received from a member this morning, the bravado-brew had clearly affected the ability of some to remember whether they were left or right handed. At least they couldn’t hit the ball hard enough to hurt themselves. If they could remain upright, that is.