McDonald's Southern Premier League, Croydon June 5, 2000

BOB's the MAN

An under-strength Havering Mayesbrook AC's under-17 boys' team found the going tough in their latest McDonald's Southern Premier league meeting at Croydon on Sunday.

Third place (168pts) behind the home club (251pts) and Aldershot, District & Farnham (191pts) was the best that could have been expected at the start of the day with Worthing (136pts) in fourth place. Nonetheless, there were clear signs once again that if the local club is ever able to field a full-strength team, some of the bigger, more successful clubs will be in for a shock.

This was particularly evident in the u-15 age group where Bob Thanda won the field man-of-the-match award with a superb Grade 1 leap of 5.89m to win the Long Jump. For good measure, he went on to take the 400m with another Grade 1 performance and was also a member of the 4x100m and 4x400m winning quartets.

In the same age group, super sprinter Matthew Kelsey again showed his opponents a clean pair of heels taking the 100m and 200m, both in Grade 1 times. Kelsey was also a member of the successful 4x100m team along with Thanda, Adam Lee and newcomer Andrew Bartlett in a time just fractionally outside the Club record.

Lee also won the Shot with a throw of 11.90m. Other members of the successful 4x400m team were Peter Phillips, Mark Connelly and Terry O'Leary who all also tasted success elsewhere. Phillips won the Discus and 'B' 400m, Connelly the 'B' High Jump and O'Leary the 'B' Discus.

The only individual winner for the u-17s was Stuart Eve in the 'B' Javelin although, in the same event, 'A' string Greg Smith with 45.77m was unfortunate to have victory snatched from him with the last throw of the competition.

Against extremely strong competition, the under-13s were unable to make much of an impression on the overall result. There were encouraging performances, however, from Andrew Luck (knocking five seconds off his pb in the 800m), Dean Shirley (Long Jump) and new personnel bests for both Kurt Smith and Christian Newton in the Shot.

The result leaves the team in a middle of the table position and almost certainly safe from relegation Many team members will be in action at Basildon on Saturday representing either Havering or Barking & Dagenham in the Essex Schools Championships and will be at the Mayesbrook Arena on Sunday for their second Eastern Young Athletes league match together with the girls u-17 squad. The opposition on Sunday consists of Norwich, Ipswich and Stevenage.

Reports: Doug Tierney

Link to match results