I am a winner! I finished the first serve season with a 4-6 6-2 6-1 victory in the final. It was tough, because I hadn’t played singles in over a month. With only 4 players in the division we were supposed to play each other twice. I got my first four matches played pretty quickly and then tried to get in touch with the other guy to schedule our games but he never responded to me. So I won those games by forfeit . The finals were supposed to be played over a three week span. I was the leader at the end of the regular season so I was supposed to play my semifinal against the guy who I hadn’t played in the regular season. After checking with the league I got a pass through that round straight to the final. I was waiting for the other two guys to play their semi and wondering about the inclement weather we had been experiencing. Three days after the deadline for the semis they played and I got word that I had to play Ben. It was not a surprise he finished second in the regular season, losing to me but beating Don twice. We tried to play before the final deadline but were rained out twice in a row. The match was finally played at Epping on Thursday 25th September.
After warming up, Ben elected to let me serve first and I opened up winning the first game. I followed that by breaking his serve and jumping out to a 2-0 lead. I am not sure if it was fatigue, my crappy first serve (I may have put one in all set) or just relaxing too much but Ben came back to win the next 5 games and lead 5-2. I responded winning two more games before he closed out the set 6-4. I had missed several easy shots just swinging the racquet through and not even touching the ball. After a bathroom break we started the second set. I aced Ben with my first serve wondering where that had come from. I jumped out to another two game lead before he evened it up. Resolving not to let this set get away from me I stopped pressing so much and just got the ball back waiting for him to make mistakes. I stretched out to a lead again and served out the set 6-2. Caroline arrived just as I won the second set which was a great help.
After warming up, Ben elected to let me serve first and I opened up winning the first game. I followed that by breaking his serve and jumping out to a 2-0 lead. I am not sure if it was fatigue, my crappy first serve (I may have put one in all set) or just relaxing too much but Ben came back to win the next 5 games and lead 5-2. I responded winning two more games before he closed out the set 6-4. I had missed several easy shots just swinging the racquet through and not even touching the ball. After a bathroom break we started the second set. I aced Ben with my first serve wondering where that had come from. I jumped out to another two game lead before he evened it up. Resolving not to let this set get away from me I stopped pressing so much and just got the ball back waiting for him to make mistakes. I stretched out to a lead again and served out the set 6-2. Caroline arrived just as I won the second set which was a great help.
I won the first game of the third and deciding set and then Ben equalised. At that point Caroline decided she had to go to get her knitting project finished for the baby shower on Saturday. It was fine i figured this was going to take a while anyway. After she left i managed to power through the remaining games and win 6-1. It was a relief having not played for so long and especially after winning all the regular season games. I also found myself a lucky ball which I carried in my pocket during the second and third sets.
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