Hampshires’ Under 19 Boys Team were unable to continue their successful winning run in the Inter County Competition. Having beaten Sussex and Kent in the first round Hants were up against Surrey and Buckinghamshire in the second. Fate began working against the team the night before the match when Paul Carnero at third string was forced to withdraw. This gave Callum Arnott, U17 team no. 1, the opportunity to contest 5th strings. Surrey had already beaten Buckinghamshire 5-0 when Hants came up against the latter. Callum confidently managed to pull off a 3-1 win Meanwhile 3rd string Pete Smith was locked in a close match, 1-2. Then a twisting retrieval caused a return of an ankle injury and the game was forfeit. Jon Morbin was looking increasingly competitive at 4th string as he levelled to 1-1, however with the fates working in the opponents favour, this was the best it got for the team. First Jon, then later Alex Phillips at 2nd string went down 3-1. Chris Rand took on Bucks nationally ranked Tom Phipps at 1st string. Although the 0-3 result was expected, Chris really pushed himself and his older opponent, winning some long rallies with great pick ups and shots.

The prospect of facing Surrey now seemed a matter of playing for the teams’ self respect, rather than in anticipation of a win. And so it was. Although the best result was achieved by late inclusion Alex Kershaw, originally for 6th string. He was the only player to win a game against opposition including U19 nationals no.4 Tom Richards and no.7 Chris Hall, U17 no.14 Joe Lee, Neil Desai and Jamie Matthews. However there were fighting efforts from all the team against what might prove to be this years winners of the U19 Inter County championships in May.

This season, the U19’s have achieved greater success than they anticipated. With only two moving out of age, and up and coming younger players in line, next year will be interesting!