Men's British Athletics League Division One - 2003: Match 3, Eton

1 Belgrave H 333; 2 Newham & Essex Beagles 318; 3 Woodford Green wEL 302; 4 Birchfield H 297; 5 Sale H Manchester 266; 6 Windsor SE&H 243; 7 Shaftesbury Barnet H 228; 8 Trafford AC 180.

Oooh! That was so close!

A strong team seven days before the event deteriorated as match day approached and with athletes chasing fast times overseas, others injured, some on holiday and some simply not turning up on the day, we found ourselves under extreme pressure. The track races started with Veteran Paul Beaumont being elevated to the A 400 hurdles, leaving the B race devoid of a claret and gold vest - the first of three such events during the afternoon. Hammer thrower John Osazuwa was another to move up to an A slot with discus specialist Scot Thompson forsaking quality for quantity as he took part in all four throws in a huge effort keep us competitive.

A strong Woodford Green outfit was going great guns with Newham & Essex Beagles slowly easing up to them and an early points score had the Bels as low as 6th. It took an hour of hard grafting before we were able to move into 5th thanks to some solid running from the 400m boys - with Geoff Dearman delighted to dip under 48 again - and Chris Moss working his way back to the big time with his second 1:48 800 clocking of the weekend.

Seni Majekodunmi has become a triple jump first team regular in 2003 and he branched out to fill another gap - this time the high jump - where he backed up Richard Aspden and they both claimed 3rd places. A season's best came from discus man Kevin Brown, thus ensuring that Scot Thompson scored heavily in the B. The 100 metres brought us two more 3rd places and Darragh O'Farrell made his league debut to place 4th in the long jump with Julian Flynn heading the B competition. Another debutant, Matt Wedge, got up to 2nd in the B sprint hurdles. Greg Beard was cock-a-hoop with his shot putt pb of 17.07m set at Ashford the previous day and he celebrated with his second best ever of 17.05 for yet another 3rd place.

The Bels had now moved into 4th but with the end of the match in sight, normally cheerful team managers were shaking their heads in despair, knowing that it would be difficult to get a strong team out for match four in Wigan. It was "all over for 2003" and "goodbye to Europe for 2004".

But now came the recovery. We had already seen some top class middle-distance running in the 800m but some sparkling front running from Spencer Barden in the 1500m gave us another classic. A sub-59 first lap by Birchfield's Murdoch was followed by Spen pushing the pace along to 1:59 at 800m and 3:00 at 1200. Only three men were in contention now - Spen, Steve Sharp and John Rogers of Sale. It was still Spen ahead with a mere 30 metres left but the Sale man lunged at the line and got the verdict. Great times and great points for us though - and two season's bests.

We are used to seeing Graham Beasley excel in league 200s but were delighted to see 17 year-old James Ellington hold his form in the face of pressure from past European Champion Dougie Walker to clinch a super double win.

Hassan Raidi attempted to go with the leaders in the 5k but faded badly over the last few laps while the more conservative Will Cockerell, last after a couple of laps, wound it up as the race progressed and was not far from his best ever - outstanding bearing in mind the 30° temperature.

Newham were now leading the match from Woodford with Belgrave 3rd but it was close - and closer still after the drama of the sprint relay. The Bels were away but a dropped baton by the Beagles at the second takeover did their hopes no good at all. They had the presence of mind to recover the stick and finish the race in last place whereupon the last man threw down the baton in disgust and uttered an expletive in his frustration. It wasn't as if his words were aimed at an official or another athlete - but he was disqualified for his actions - a penalty made even harsher when it was realised that Shaftesbury and Woodford had already been dq'd for zone infringement. The 8th place that the Beagle had thrown away was actually worth six points.

The net result was that with two events to go Newham & Essex Beagles now led the Bels by one point!

The steeplechase: Beagler Dave Mitchinson had already run the 5k and now gamely turned out again to keep his club's hopes alive but it was clubmate Robinson who forced the pace and opened up around 50 metres on our own Kevin Nash. With Mitchinson heading Simon Marwood in the B race it looked as if the Beagles would extend their lead. While Simon shredded a little toe in his fight with Mitchinson, Kevin edged closer to Robinson as the last lap approached. Still 30 metres down at the bell, he closed rapidly round the turn, got to within 10 metres in the back straight - and flew the final turn with water jump barrier untouched as he hurdled it at full speed to storm away to a 7 second win. Instead of losing four points we'd come out even!

The management were confident of pulling off the long relay with Tim Benjamin anchoring a squad of Dearman, Bayley and Osho that would surely already be leading - and so it proved. But now the Essex men faced another disqualification when a man clearly took the baton before the start of the takeover zone.

We won in the end by 15 points having gone into the lead on the very last event. But for the dqs we'd have lost by a single point.

Note: although the official results include wind readings for the track events, as they are all apparently 0.0 it is assumed that no actual wind reading was recorded.

100m: A (0.0) 1 T.Edgar (Woodford GwEL) 10.49; 2 D.Plummer (Newham &EB) 10.55; 3 Graham Beasley (Belgrave) 10.59; 4 M.Tietz (Birchfield) 10.69; 7 A.Matthews (Windsor SE&H) 10.82; 8 K.Ellis (Trafford) 10.92.
B (0.0) 1 M.Findlay (Newham &EB) 10.72; 2 A.Mensah (Shaftesbury B) 10.78; 3 Dan Donovan (Belgrave) 10.79; 4 M.Miah (Woodford GwEL) 10.81; 5 R.Tabares (Birchfield) 10.94; 6 A.Ademuyewo (Sale HM) 10.95; 7 F.Wright (Windsor SE&H) 11.07; 8 C.Hamilton (Trafford) 11.19.

200m: A (0.0) 1 Graham Beasley (Belgrave) 21.09; 2 G.Hedman (Woodford GwEL) 21.24; 3 D.Plummer (Newham &EB) 21.30; 4 J.Stewart (Sale HM) 21.85; 5 J.Thomas (Birchfield) 22.04; 6 A.Matthews (Windsor SE&H) 22.09; 7 A.Mensah (Shaftesbury B) 22.12; 8 K.Ellis (Trafford) 23.03.
B (0.0) 1 James Ellington U20 (Belgrave) 21.70; 2 D.Walker (Newham &EB) 21.73; 3 A.Ademuyewo (Sale HM) 22.02; 4 A.Williams (Birchfield) 22.17; 5 M.Holloway (Windsor SE&H) 22.36; 6 M.Miah (Woodford GwEL) 22.58; 7 N.Ossai (Shaftesbury B) 23.04; 8 C.Hamilton (Trafford) 23.06.

400m: A 1 A.Potter (Woodford GwEL) 47.79; 2 Tim Bayley (Belgrave) 48.12; 3 L.Basini (Birchfield) 48.36; 4 I.Lowthian (Sale HM) 48.36; 5 S.Plaskitt (Trafford) 48.39; 6 R.Morgan (Windsor SE&H) 49.57; 7 R.Moseley (Shaftesbury B) 50.23; 8 G.Watson (Newham &EB) 51.55.
B 1 D.Ladejo (Birchfield) 47.04; 2 Geoff Dearman (Belgrave) 47.88; 3 J.Christie (Windsor SE&H) 48.26; 4 A.Williamson (Sale HM) 48.37; 5 R.Workman (Trafford) 48.94; 6 B.Gibb (Shaftesbury B) 49.05; 7 R.Scott (Woodford GwEL) 49.20; 8 O.Thomassen (Newham &EB) 52.64.

800m: A 1 M.Shone (Woodford GwEL) 1:48.46; 2 Chris Moss (Belgrave) 1:48.65; 3 M.Farah (Windsor SE&H) 1:48.69; 4 L.Basini (Birchfield) 1:50.60; 5 G.Cuddy (Sale HM) 1:52.42; 6 A.Hodgkinson (Shaftesbury B) 1:53.54; 7 G.Watson (Newham &EB) 1:54.26; 8 D.Scott (Trafford) 1:57.06.
B 1 E.Cissey (Sale HM) 1:53.20; 2 A.Brown (Woodford GwEL) 1:53.37; 3 S.Overall (Windsor SE&H) 1:54.26; 4 P.Cooper (Shaftesbury B) 1:55.45; 6 Graeme Oudney (Belgrave) 1:57.03; 7 C.Jones (Trafford) 1:57.96; 8 J.Corbett (Newham &EB) 1:59.69.

1500m: A 1 J.Rogers (Sale HM) 3:43.90; 2 Spencer Barden (Belgrave) 3:44.07; 3 I.Murdoch (Birchfield) 3:47.54; 4 S.Haughian (Windsor SE&H) 3:47.83; 5 C.Reynolds (Woodford GwEL) 3:48.79; 6 O.Laws (Newham &EB) 3:51.27; 7 J.Trapmore (Shaftesbury B) 3:53.11; 8 T.Egerton (Trafford) 4:01.50.
B 1 Stephen Sharp 3:44.71; 2 M.Openshaw (Birchfield) 3:49.55; 3 S.North (Sale HM) 3:51.44; 4 A.Brown (Woodford GwEL) 3:54.75; 5 C.Bannon (Windsor SE&H) 3:56.94; 6 S.Murphy (Shaftesbury B) 3:59.28; 7 A.Ali (Newham &EB) 4:11.41; 8 A.Franklin (Trafford) 4:21.34.

5000m: A 1 A.Franklin (Trafford) 14:48.08; 2 D.Mitchinson (Newham &EB) 14:54.21; 3 A.Van-Zyl (Shaftesbury B) 14:56.15; 4 D.Augustus (Sale HM) 15:02.69; 5 A.Swearman (Birchfield) 15:05.18; 6 R.Lee (Windsor SE&H) 15:06.32; 7 Will Cockerell (Belgrave) 15:06.59; 8 L.Mangleshot (Woodford GwEL) 16:01.23.
B 1 M.Murray (Trafford) 15:18.35; 2 Hassan Raidi (Belgrave) 15:21.42; 3 P.Wickes (Windsor SE&H) 15:21.71; 4 M.Whitehouse (Birchfield) 15:32.65; 5 N.Addison (Shaftesbury B) 15:36.84; 6 J.Philipson (Woodford GwEL) 17:40.23.

110mH: A (0.0) 1 W.Erese (Woodford GwEL) 13.77; 2 D.Greaves (Newham &EB) 13.79; 3 A.Scott (Shaftesbury B) 14.61; 4 L.Collins (Sale HM) 14.69; 5 Noel Levy (Belgrave) 14.89; 6 J.Heanley (Windsor SE&H) 15.23; 7 T.McGlynn (Trafford) 15.48.
B (0.0) 1 D.Mallins (Newham &EB) 14.24; 2 Matt Wedge (Belgrave) 14.92; 3 L.Okoroafo (Woodford GwEL) 14.99; 4 G.Dunson (Shaftesbury B) 15.00; 5 C.Tye-Walker (Windsor SE&H) 15.03; 6 R.Gascoyne (Sale HM) 16.00; 7 C.Ball (Trafford) 18.30.

400mH: A 1 A.Borsumato (Sale HM) 49.62; 2 B.Yiend (Birchfield) 51.26; 3 J.Christie (Windsor SE&H) 51.40; 4 R.Scott (Woodford GwEL) 52.41; 5 R.McDonald (Shaftesbury B) 52.58; 6 R.Gardner (Newham &EB) 54.74; 7 T.McGlynn (Trafford) 55.02; 8 Paul Beaumont M40 (Belgrave) 57.96.
B 1 L.Collins (Sale HM) 52.96; 2 A.Clements (Windsor SE&H) 54.63; 3 O.Thomassen (Newham &EB) 54.89; 4 G.Dunson (Shaftesbury B) 55.22; 5 K.Deighton (Woodford GwEL) 55.41; 6 C.Ball (Trafford) 58.76; 7 P.Hibbert (Birchfield) 58.82; no Belgrave competitor.

3000mSC: A 1 Kevin Nash 8:52.90; 2 A.Robinson (Newham &EB) 8:59.13; 3 S.Bailey (Sale HM) 9:04.56; 4 J.Sear (Woodford GwEL) 9:20.47; 5 E.Wander (Birchfield) 9:37.14; 6 T.Hyde (Windsor SE&H) 9:40.67; 7 A.Murphy (Shaftesbury B) 9:48.86; 8 M.Hutchinson (Trafford) 9:59.81.
B 1 D.Mitchinson (Newham &EB) 9:13.74; 2 Simon Marwood (Belgrave) 9:17.08; 3 K.Murphy (Woodford GwEL) 9:27.87; 4 T.Waumsley (Windsor SE&H) 9:43.98; 5 J.Bailey (Sale HM) 9:51.67; 6 R.Williams (Shaftesbury B) 9:57.55; 7 K.Raynor (Trafford) 10:23.80.

4x100m: 1 Belgrave H 40.88 (Graham Beasley, Dan Donovan, Tim Benjamin, James Ellington U17); 2 Windsor SE&H 41.89; 3 Birchfield 42.37; 4 Sale HM 44.01; 5 Trafford 44.37.

4x400m: 1 Belgrave H 3:11.58 (Geoff Dearman 48.5, Tim Bayley 48.1, Set Osho U17 48.6, Tim Benjamin 46.4); 2 Birchfield 3:12.17; 3 Woodford GwEL 3:18.31; 4 Sale HM 3:19.34; 5 Shaftesbury B 3:20.41; 6 Windsor SE&H 3:20.99; 7 Trafford 3:24.51; dq Newham &EB.

High J: A 1 D.Grant (Woodford GwEL) 2.16; 2 I.Holliday (Sale HM) 2.05; 3 Richard Aspden (Belgrave) 2.00; 4 D.Stone (Shaftesbury B) 2.00; 5 C.Hall (Birchfield) 2.00; 6 T.Gilhooly (Newham &EB) 1.95; 7 J.Heanley (Windsor SE&H) 1.85; 8 S.Alexander (Trafford) 1.75.
B 1 D.Plank (Birchfield) 1.90; 2 N.Oboh (Newham &EB) 1.85; 3 Seni Majekodunmi (Belgrave) 1.80; =4 B,Shiel (Windsor SE&H) 1.80; =4 E.Yusuf (Shaftesbury B) 1.80; 6 P.Howard (Woodford GwEL) 1.80; 7 T.McGlynn (Trafford) 1.70; 8 R.Gascoyne (Sale HM) 1.70.

Long J: A 1 J.Moore (Birchfield) 7.33/0.2; 2 D.Ritchie (Sale HM) 7.31/0.3; 3 C.Davidson (Newham &EB) 7.08/0.4; 4 Darragh O’Farrell (Belgrave) 7.08/1.3; 5 A.Hall (Woodford GwEL) 7.06/1.4; 6 J.Addai-Poku (Shaftesbury B) 6.85/1.7; 7 M.Holloway (Windsor SE&H 6.68/1.3; 8 P.Ralph (Trafford) 6.57/1.1.
B 1 Julian Flynn (Belgrave) 6.92/0.3; 2 L.Edwards (Newham &EB) 6.88w/3.2; 3 N.Dowsett (Woodford GwEL 6.81/1.4; 4 L.Smith (Birchfield) 6.79/1.0; 5 R.Blair (Shaftesbury B) 6.65/1.2; 6 J.Golley (Windsor SE&H) 6.60/0.8; 7 R.Reeder (Sale HM) 6.32/0.2; 8 T.McGlynn (Trafford) 6.26/0.2.

Triple J: A 1 N.Thomas (Newham &EB) 15.57/0.2; 2 J.Golley (Windsor SE&H) 15.50/0.2; 3 Seni Majekodunmi (Belgrave) 14.42/0.5; 4 L.Harvey (Trafford) 14.22/-0.9; 5 M.McKerran (Birchfield) 13.86/0.8; 6 K.Newton (Woodford GwEL) 13.79/0.6; 7 D.Sanderson (Sale HM) 13.44/-0.4; 8 M.Corrigan 12.92/0.2.
B 1 T.Salou (Newham &EB) 14.74/0.2; 2 M.Rossiter (Windsor SE&H) 14.60/0.3; 3 P.Ralph (Trafford) 14.19/1.0; 4 David Wellstead (Belgrave) 14.09/1.0; 5 S.Ojo (Woodford GwEL) 13.69/-0.4; 6 P.Ferdinand (Birchfield) 13.68/-0.1; 7 R.Blair (Shaftesbury B) 11.53/1.1.

Pole V: A 1 S.Simpson (Birchfield) 5.20; 2 I.Tullett (Shaftesbury B) 5.10; 3 M.Christie (Sale HM) 4.90; 4 C.North (Woodford GwEL) 4.80; 5 K.Hughes (Newham &EB) 4.80; 6 Ben Flint (Belgrave) 4.80; 7 C.Mills (Windsor SE&H) 4.60; 8 M.Hutchinson (Trafford) 2.10.
B 1 J.Heanley (Windsor SE&H) 4.40; 2 M.Buck (Woodford GwEL) 4.20; 3 D.Cooper (Newham &EB) 4.00; 4 W.Huber (Shaftesbury B) 3.00; no Belgrave competitor.

Shot: A 1 S.Rider (Birchfield) 17.67; 2 M.Proctor (Newham &EB) 17.44; 3 Greg Beard (Belgrave) 17.05; 4 I.McMullan (Trafford) 15.82; 5 A.Soalla-Bell (Shaftesbury B) 14.41; 6 M.Wiseman (Sale HM) 14.33; 7 R.Earle (Woodford GwEL) 12.74; 8 S.Clague (Windsor SE&H) 11.51.
B 1 S.Litton-Hayes (Newham &EB) 14.94; 2 N.Vince (Shaftesbury B) 14.12; 3 Scot Thompson (Belgrave) 13.93; 4 R.Bate (Trafford) 12.77; 5 G.Smith (Birchfield) 12.54; 6 A.Frost (Woodford GwEL) 12.46; 7 E.Scott (Windsor SE&H) 10.35; 8 M.Floyd (Sale) 9.74.

Discus: A 1 E.Udechuku (Woodford GwEL) 59.00; 2 G.Smith (Birchfield) 54.56; 3 Kevin Brown (Belgrave) 52.59; 4 N.Thompson (Shaftesbury B) 50.63; 5 S.Litton-Hayes (Newham &EB) 49.69; 6 M.Wiseman (Sale HM) 49.22; 7 R.Bate (Trafford) 41.72; 8 S.Clague (Windsor SE&H) 38.12.
B 1 Scot Thompson (Belgrave) 50.41; 2 S.Rider (Birchfield) 50.25; 3 M.Proctor (Newham &EB) 49.48; 4 A.Soalla-Bell (Shaftesbury B) 41.94; 5 C.Howe (Woodford GwEL) 39.00; 6 I.McMullan (Trafford) 37.77; 7 J.Parkin (Sale HM) 36.24; 8 E.Scott (Windsor SE&H) 32.46.

Javelin: A 1 M.Roberson (Newham &EB) 71.85; 2 M.Allan (Trafford) 68.78; 3 B.Houghton (Windsor SE&H) 66.87; 4 D.Parker (Shaftesbury B) 64.23; 5 M.Tarren (Birchfield) 60.58; 6 P.Cooper (Woodford GwEL) 57.75; 7 S.Thompson (Belgrave)51.81; 8 M.Wiseman (Sale HM) 49.29.
B 1 T.Smith (Shaftesbury B) 54.37; 2 P.Howard (Woodford GwEL) 53.37; 3 P.Ostapowycz (Trafford) 52.36; 4 S.Greening (Birchfield) 52.03; 5 J.Heanley (Windsor SE&H) 45.75; 6 D.Strevens (Newham &EB) 45.73; 7 J.Bailey (Sale HM) 23.33; no Belgrave competitor.

Hammer: A 1 B.Beauchamp (Newham &EB) 71.15; 2 M.Floyd (Sale HM) 65.37; 3 A.Frost (Woodford GwEL) 63.07; 4 M.Bell (Birchfield) 61.27; 5 S.Sammut (Windsor SE&H) 59.35; 6 G.Holder (Shaftesbury B) 57.09; 7 John Osazuwa (Belgrave) 55.51; 8 R.Bate (Trafford) 49.46.
B 1 S.Bown (Newham &EB) 62.56; 2 C.Howe (Woodford GwEL) 60.24; 3 M.Sutton (Birchfield) 54.92; 4 A.James (Windsor SE&H) 50.68; 5 J.Parkin (Sales HM) 46.10; 6 Scot Thompson (Belgrave) 42.55; 7 D.Martin (Trafford) 34.19.

Restored from the club's earlier website, belgraveharriers.com, and published here as originally written.