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Division One ended in style, so we take a final canter through the Apsley League to celebrate the winners, and commiserate with the losers.

No fewer than three teams managed to trip the Apsley League's new points deduction rule, giving up two points each for every fixture that they conceded as a walkover. All three went down in the end, and it didn’t have to be that way. Have clubs learned a lesson? We’ll see next summer, but the new rule was certainly effective.

We look back on our expectations from the start of the summer, and see who won the predictions league between Dave and Tom.

The Hampshire Singles boxes also closed for the summer, bringing us a new Champion of Champions in Group One, and nine champs in total across the groups. We mull over whether the time has come to cut non-players once and for all. Swing that scythe, league admin!

And we are campaigning for players to join up, as well. Thanks to all of you who did - we saw a ton of new players pop up in the boxes when they were unveiled on Saturday, including lots of listeners and previous show guests.

Learn more about the HIOW singles boxes here:

https://competitions.lta.org.uk/box-ladder/5799c945-d321-4a8d-af94-98821eb2d3ef/event/1/round/8

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The sun is dropping that bit earlier, players are dropping out of the pro tour to rest and there are just four fixtures left in the Apsley League - summer is well and truly coming to an end around us.

With the final weekend ahead, we look at the biggest prize left on offer - Division One survival. All four teams at the bottom of Div One are in action this weekend. Which two teams will survive out of Riverside B, David Lloyd Southampton B and Thornden B? One of them will be toast by Sunday. Well, in Div Two anyways.

We salute Riverside, who played both their remaining Premier Division fixtures to finish as high up the Premier Division as possible with maximum points from a busy weekend of road tripping.

Elsewhere, the current round of the Hampshire singles boxes also come to a close this weekend, and Tom’s been padelling again.

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Thornden have won the Premier Division for a third successive summer, but Riverside took them all the way in their fixture - so nearly getting the win, and forcing a tie.

Wellow are on the up, we debate whether their new courts - subject to local press interest this week — will be enough to help them stay in the Premier Division next season, now that they are locked in for promotion out of Division One.

Twyford A went down in the end, but at least the C Team (featuring Dave!) had a good day out against Winchester C. Tom may have to recalibrate the age brackets in Div Four, however.

Relegation scrambles continue in Divisions One, Two and Three, so there’s still plenty to play for here in Spillover Season.

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Saturday September 13 was originally scheduled to be the end of the summer season when Apsley schedules came out all the way back in April.

As it happens, this summer’s rollercoaster of heatwaves and washouts means we will still have a dozen fixtures left after Saturday is done, but plenty of things will be decided this weekend. Tom doesn’t see any way Thornden can’t realistically wrap up the Premier Division, but the Inception-level scenarios around Premier relegation mean things could extend into the post season there.

Winchester A played the best team that any division has seen this season, the biggest of the big guns. Was it enough to stay up?

Meanwhile Division Three gets an official winner, a week after e declared the winner. Were we right? Find out this episode.

Elsewhere, we’re getting ready for winter. Old man Dave made sure his boiler got checked, and whipper snapper Tom managed to finish his Winter League meeting in 40 minutes. Where’s the fun in that?

Thanks to the listeners who sent Dave videos of the Winter meeting so he could feel like he was there all the way from Singapore. That’s a lot more than Tom, or indeed Dsve's brother Rob, did….

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We’re getting to the business end of the season, which is a terrible time for Dave to be stranded in America and Tom to be busy in Southampton.

We can’t unite for a dual podcast this week, but we’ve got a Quick Hit update here to get you up to speed.

The County Champs are over - it looks like a changing of the guard among some of the elite men could be on the cards, while on the women’s side of things it’s good to see last year’s runner-up go one better this time.

In the Apsley League, two more divisions have been wrapped up, leaving just the Premier Division and Div Two in contention for gold medals heading into the final few weeks.

There are still plenty of promotion and relegation battles to keep us going!

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We're reunited in the UK and joined by another special guest!

Pete Guerreri, from tennis royalty in Swanmore and currently captain of the National League team from David Lloyd West End, joins this episode.

There's certainly plenty to talk about. Pete and Tom shares some memories from their debuts at the Hampshire & Isle of Wight County Championships, which wrap up this weekend. They give their own experiences some pretty high ratings.

But... we can all strive for better, and they've got some thoughts for Winchester and the event organisers for future events.

Shockwaves up and down the leagues late in the season have people wondering about paying players in county tennis. There seem to be a few mercenaries out there - racquets for hire - who might be giving some clubs a leg up.

Is that bad, or just how sports goes these days? And maybe there are legit reasons to offer compensation to some players, some times. We hear from the league, the pod and we want your views too.

Find Pete at: www.youtube.com/@peterguerreri7143

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This week we look back on a high-octane weekend of action that made Thornden champions-elect, brought Winchester A its first win for almost three seasons, and shows us that South Hants B could sweep in on Division Three out of nowhere.

The County Championships start this weekend. Tom is taking part, and we get his thoughts on signing up, the onerous availability requirements (turns out it's not so bad actually!) and how deep he hopes to go.

In the weekend ahead we have some pretty chilled out fixtures to look forward to and a Bank Holiday Monday to boot. The weather forecasts says low 20's and sunny all weekend. These are happy days in Hampshire tennis.

We'll miss all this come the winter. But why spend any time thinking about that now?

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Club summer seasons will be made and broken this weekend in the Apsley League, so how could we possibly leave you hanging without an episode?

Dave is in Greece and Tom is working hard on the day job but we found a way to make this episode against all the odds. We talk about where the tables stand now that the season is 75% complete — and who has promotion or relegation on the line this weekend.

Before all that we congratulate the Hampshire warriors who played at the Masters in Wimbledon this week. One of our very own is a champion, and kudos is due!

We also celebrate the return of the Hampshire & Isle of Wight County Championships. Who’s back to defend their 2024 titles? Which of the pod members signed up for this year’s Men’s singles championship? And is there really a Southampton Filipino Tennis Club??

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