* Cattermull Cup (Handicap Alumni Tournament) 2025

The Friday group was quite experienced in this competition containing a former winner in King’s Canterbury, a two times finalist in Wimbledon High and last year’s winner in Haileybury 1. The ‘joker’ in the group was Highgate who had a difficult high handicap to contend with. King’s suffered an injury which involved them playing their last two matches with their own additional handicap. The match between Wimbledon High and Haileybury was a particularly engaging watch, with long rests and endless seemingly impossible retrieves. However, all this time, Epsom College were just going about their business, hitting the Dedans with monotonous regularity, making few mistakes and beating every pair put in front of them to win the group. The fact that one of their pair was due to be in Cornwall for the rest of the weekend seemed incidental!

Group 2 was fairly even and was played without major incident. The group contained Sherborne, Wellington, Tonbridge, Charterhouse 2 and Haileybury 2. Tonbridge had a relatively high handicap but displayed some true grit, saving two match points to prevail against Sherborne for example. They went on to win the group.

A rolling lunch was taken as all players indulged their various pre and post match routines during a day of good competition. It made for easy viewing as the ‘double dedans’ at Middlesex is a very attractive environment. You can watch intently in the main dedans with the marker or casually while conversing with fellow players in the eating and drinking area, while other players stretch (and strain) their tired bodies in the lobby.

Group 3 contained some extremely close matches too with many 5-4 results. In fact, the markers were somewhat concerned with the schedule slipping by the end of it! Previous winners Clifton and Stonyhurst were pitted against Rugby, Harrow 2 and a young Canford pair who were competing for the first time. Perhaps the highlight was an outstanding

20 shot rest between Stonyhurst and Canford which culminated in one of the Canford players actually snapping the stem of his racket with the winning point. When I turned to Will Burns to comment on the length of the rally, it became apparent that he instinctively counts these things as part of his marking routine! There was much talk of how the player might approach Grays for a replacement since this happens so infrequently.

Group 4 was ‘hot’ with several pairs sporting handicaps in the 30s (Harrow 1, Charterhouse 1) while St Andrews Totteridge even had a high 20s handicap. St Edwards and Eton completed the group for what proved a very engaging evening. Jack’s marking was well up to the increased intensity and velocity of shot. Eton had a pair with contrasting styles but playing ‘side by side’ whereas Charterhouse opted for a ‘front and back’ formation which led to some very different tactics on court. The serving was of particularly high quality and the power exuded kept those watching in the dedans engaged too. It was Harrow 1 who prevailed in this group, so we had the prospect of the two Harrow pairs meeting in a semi-final.

Sunday 6th April (once again) proved to be a real ‘business end’ of the competition with Epsom (40.7) playing the first semi final against Tonbridge (63.3) and Harrow 1 (37.3) playing the second against their own Harrow 2 (62.6). This was going to be a mental challenge during best of 3 sets in each case.

The first semi-final involved 10 match points before Tonbridge finally prevailed 6-4, 6-3. Although they played well, Epsom did not display their error free tennis of the group stages. The second semi was obviously going to require supreme concentration from the better pair and they started well, getting to 6-2, 4-1 up before the odd error crept into their game and their opponents started playing better. With apparently nothing to lose by ‘going for it’, in the event, the better pair lost the final two sets 4-6; what a swing.

It made for a more balanced final to have two similarly matched pairs following two such ‘stressed’ semi-finals. The mind can only concentrate for so long in these tournaments! So, Tonbridge v Harrow 2, playing off ‘owe quarter 15’ was the final to be played next. Tonbridge won the first set 6-2, but were 1-3 down in the second and another swing looked on the cards. That was before they collected themselves to recover to

5-4 and finally prevailing 6-5 to win the match. Harrow had won the trophy previously in 2015, but Tonbridge is another well-deserved name to appear on it after this performance.

For Tonbridge, Richard Dalzell was partnered by Sam Lowres to win the tournament and on a personal note, we were all delighted given how much he has done for Old Tonbridgian Real Tennis over the years. It was a fitting achievement. We had a laugh at his expense when he shouted ‘leave’ to his partner when defending a chase only to be hit on the head as the ball bounced up off the back wall!

Paul Cattermull, Will Burns & Jack Carter