Magdalen put Nose out of joint
Mark Butt
A DETERMINED DISPLAY by Magdalen against a battling Brasenose side saw them emerge victorious in the men's tennis Cuppers final on Sunday. Both sides had to cope with gusty conditions on the grass courts at Iffley Road, but they adapted to the task superbly to produce a suitably enthralling climax to the knockout tournament.
In the opening rubbers, the key encounter saw the Magdalen first pairing of Adeel Qalbani and Dennis Geronimus come up against the seconds of Brasenose, Max Lang and captain Julien Olszyna-Marzys. Even before the match began the omens seemed to favour Magdalen when Lang inadvertently struck the ball against his partner during the warm-up. Fortunately, serious injury was avoided as the ball thumped against the peak of the Brasenose captain's baseball cap. Bizarrely, this freak incident seemed to focus the minds of the Brasenose pair who broke serve in the very first game. However, both sides were quickly into their stride and the first set developed into an open and entertaining spectacle.
Eventually, the scores were levelled up when Magdalen broke back in the sixth game of the set, and they reaffirmed their dominance two games later, when they broke again thanks to persistent and consistent low returns against Lang's serve. This was enough to give them the first set 6-3, but there was to be no surrender by their lower ranked opposition who again dictated the early pace in the following set.
After a succession of tightly fought points at the net, Magdalen resorted to power play in an attempt to regain superiority. Mistakes began to creep into the Brasenose game, and although Lang and Olszyna-Marzys had fought bravely against strong opposition, they went down by two sets, losing 6-3, 6-3. Meanwhile the other opening rubbers went according to the formbook. Magdalen's seconds were victorious over Brasenose thirds 6-3, 6-2, but the match was kept tight by the Brasenose firsts, who comprehensively defeated Magdalen's third pairing 6-3, 6-1.
The second round of rubbers would see each pairing come up against their opposite numbers in what looked to be three extremely tightly fought contests. This was precisely how it unfolded as two of the matches were split one set all. The battle of the seconds saw the Brasenose duo bounce back from their defeat in the opening rubber, to take the first set on a tiebreak.
The second set was just as close, but some excellent serving by Danny Peel and Danny Bloomfield, saw Magdalen claim the honours, with just one break of serve the difference in a 6-4 win. The match between the thirds followed a similar pattern, with both sets going down to the wire before the spoils were eventually shared. After conceding the first set, Magdalen's Ackerman and Bouclier were desperate to avoid a second successive defeat and they displayed great resolve to avert several match points and take a dramatic tiebreak 7-4. Strangely enough, the match between both first pairings highlighted the biggest difference in class; Qalbani and Geronimus disposing of the Brasenose firsts with far more comfort than they had done the seconds in a 6-2, 6-1 triumph.
All this meant that Magdalen were finally within sight of victory, and just two sets would hand them Cuppers success. Essentially speaking, a victory for the in-form first pair from Magdalen against the Brasenose thirds of Henry Fyson and Jonathan Delaney would be enough for overall success. After three hours of keenly contested tennis it seemed that Brasenose were resigned to defeat in this final encounter. They had worked exceptionally hard to match Magdalen, who came into the match as favourites, but in the end it was a bridge too far for the underdogs who went down 6-0, 6-0 in this deciding rubber.
A highly deserved victory for the Brasenose seconds over Magdalen thirds would offer little compensation to the captain Julien Olszyna-Marzys, as his side went down in the match 12-6. In contrast, the Magdalen captain, Noam Scheiber, was understandably delighted with his team's progress this season, culminating in this Cuppers triumph. "It was a gruelling run to the final but I was confident that once we got here we would take it. We seemed to improve every week, just playing well enough to win every time out, and it proved to be the difference. It was tight after the first round but we saw a little daylight and pulled it out in the second round."
Scheiber was quick to acknowledge some expert advice he'd received in the run up to the final. "I was talking to Mary Pierce's father on Saturday night after she'd won the French Open. He's a real brawler himself and he's known for being pretty physical and aggressive, even in the stands. He told us to go out with the same fire in our stomachs and I think we did that today."
8th Jun 2000