Halford Hewitt 2019 Write UP

Our 2019 campaign will go down as one with many broken records and us proceeding into the second round (thus avoiding the Plate Competition) but no further sadly. After a useful practice day for the evident top ten of our touring party of 20 (somewhat depleted from the original list of 24) the pairings were announced over dinner at The Frog and Scot for Thursday’s round 1 encounter with Highgate – a mid tier ranked team.

In a very exciting match that vindicated captain Dan Burstow with his canny pairings and team order in achieving a finest win for Hurstpierpoint in the record of the Halford Hewitt competition – yes back to 1930! The 4/1 win saw all pairs playing confidently and with great determination.

Mike Harrison (our statistician) has prepared a fantastic record of our Halford Hewitt performances over the decades and his analysis is now on line within the HH section of the website and will be updated annually.

As always our loyal supporters kept our spirits up at all times during the competition as well as in the bar….. it was great to see our President Rob McCowen, Our Secretary Graham Negus, Dudley Stratford, Rick Holgate, Jim Fawcett, John Fraser and our Treasurer Patrick McGahan. We were also lucky to have substitutes and supporters in the form of Mark Baldock and Mike Harrison.

Rossall beat us 3.5 to 1.5 on Friday morning, this seeing Dan Burstow and debutante Alex Fleet undefeated in their two matches and Alex having a 100% HH record! George Atkins and Paul Turrell faded a little at the end of their game which ended up earning them half a point from a competitive game where they were never behind. The remaining 3 pairs where pitted against tough opponents in the case of match 1 – Joe White and Will Carroll,  whilst Ogden and Fairfax and the back pair of Waud and Kelly were not on as great form as the day before.

Rossall, after dispatching us, were beaten 3.5 to 1.5 by our old adversaries Watsons in round three at Deal.https://www.halfordhewitt.org/halford-hewitt/the-draw/

The Hewitt Award, presented by Rob McCowen and now in its 8th year, went to the undefeated partnership of Dan Burstow and Alex Fleet. They had victories of 3/2 over Highgate and 2/1 over Rossall, scoring two valuable points for Hurst. These wins were particularly gratifying  as it was Alex’s first appearance in the Hewitt and Dan’s first year as Captain of the team. Long may this undefeated partnership continue!

We are very enthused by our renewed winning streak and the level of young blood and talent in the team. Lets hope that next year we can field George Mills, Charlie Parsons and Sam Sullivan for the first time. we also hope that absentees, Freddie Newmarch, Chris Hobbs and Christian Wimshurst can stay off dangerous sports in the weeks and months leading up to the Hewitt!