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Toop and Wiseman win the 2010 London

Matthew Wiseman and James Toop retained their London Tournament in fine style at Eton yesterday, defeating fellow Olavians Seb Cooley and Peter Cohen in a high quality, high intensity and high speed final 12-8, 12-4, 13-12. James, by his own admission, was not quite playing at his best as he was still adjusting back to the demands of the Eton game having retained his Rugby Fives singles title the previous week.

Nevertheless, he was able to produce maintain a very consistent level of play to support his partner Matthew Wiseman who was on top form, fast and aggressive around the court and not giving his opponenets an inch. Peter and Seb, in their first major final together, pushed the champions hard and had chances in the third game to turn the match their way, with a 10-7 lead and one rally at game ball the closest they came to taking the match into a fourth game.

Earlier, in the semi-finals, Matthew and James had defeated John Reynolds and George Campbell, while Seb and Peter saw off the challenge of Richard Tyler and Dave Mew.

London Tournament Festival

John Reynolds reports:

A schoolboy from the City of London School, Max Twivy, has won the London tournament festival final, in partnership with Old Citizen Nick Gill. Twivy and Gill came back from one-two down to beat veteran Lancing Old Boy Nigel Cox and Old Salopian Ian Mitchell in five games. The tournament climax was held on Wednesday after the competitors ran out of time and energy to hold it on the day of the rest of the event, on Sunday.

The Citizen pair started strongly, former Cambridge half blue Gill cutting and returning cut effectively enough to take the first game. Cox and Mitchell's experience then told and they took the next two but the Citizens had the spirit and technique to mount a successful comeback. Afterwards, Twivy said: "My cutting was atrocious. We could have had a more comfortable win had 90% of my cuts not been returned. Having said that, it was satisfying coming back from 1-2 down."
Gill said: "Nigel and Ian played on Max quite heavily in sets two and three, and looked to have taken control before Max worked them out and adjusted to their patterns of play in the fourth set so that we were able to sneak that before going into an early lead in the final set, pulling out in front and then hanging on for dear life to take it by two points."

Although the City of London School lost its courts in the early 1980s when it moved 400 yards east to its present site near St Pauls Cathedral, schoolboys play on the courts at Westminster school once a week, coached by Kinnaird champion Matt Wiseman, and have been joining Old Citizen evening practices at Highgate.

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