Under 25s: Six And Out For Young

23/09/24: Hugo Young & Charles Plummer retained their Men's Under 25 in association with Advanta Wealth title at Highgate on Sunday in their final year at this level, with Hugo breaking the men's record having won for a sixth time.

Since the U25 tournament was rebooted in 2009, there hasn't been a year without one of the following four players in the winning pair: Andrew Joyce (5), Laurie Brock (4), Riki Houlden (5) and Hugo Young (5). This year was Hugo's last chance to move one ahead and take a sixth successive win in the competition. He was again partnered by Charles Plummer, and although they were strong favourites coming into the competition there were several other strong pairs hoping to do a bit of giant-killing and start their own winning run.

The first positive news of the day was the weather; the organiser had driven to Highgate (and indeed drove away from Highgate later on) through some apocalyptic rain. Highgate itself, though, and most importantly the floors of its Fives courts, remained resolutely dry all day, with the sun even attempting to make an appearance on a couple of occasions.

The eleven pairs were divided initially into two groups to sort out the pecking order for the knockout stages. Group A - the group of six - was relatively routine, without any close matches and a clearly defined hierarchy emerging quite quickly. Young & Plummer cruised through unbeaten, with scratch pairing Isaac Weaver & Fred Prickett second, Westminsters Alex Vinen & Alex Benson third, ex-QEB pair Abilash Sivathasan & Avinash Kumararuban in fourth, young Etonians Alexander Burford & Paul de Caraman Chimay fifth and Westway's Lucas Ng & Theo Santos in sixth.

Group B - the group of five - proved to be rather more closely fought. Last year's finalists Gwydion Wiseman & Jack Pemberton were slow out of the blocks and had to work hard to come back from 1-6 down against the top Eton pair of Toby Webster & Hugo Turpin in their first game, while the Cambridge past and present pair of Max Krefting & Theo Seely got the better of another Light Blue Lewis Drummond, who was playing with Salopian Ed Evans. The fifth pair in this group - Olavians Prajeeth Sathiyamoorthy & Tanish Arjaria - hit the ground running and headed through to a final round showdown for first and second place in the group with Jack & Gwydion, a key match in determining seedings for the knockout draw. This was a tight, tense and occasionally nervy affair, which ended with an unfortunate gameball cut heading out of court to give Prajeeth & Tanish a 12-10 win. Turpin & Webster maintained their strong start to come third thanks to a 12-9 win over Krefting & Seely, with Drummond & Evans unlucky to be left empty-handed despite playing some very decent Fives.

The strength in depth of the field meant that the top four from each group went through to a quarter-final round. Three of these were straightforward, with convincing wins for Young & Plummer over Krefting & Seely, Weaver & Prickett over Webster & Turpin and Sathiyamoorthy & Arjaria over Sivathasan & Kumararuban but the fourth match justfied the format, as Wiseman & Pemberton again struggled to hit top form, although this was undoubtedly partially due to a terrific display from the two Westminster Alexes. To their credit, though, Gwydion & Jack fought back well when under severe pressure and eventually managed to get over the line 15-13 to take their place in the last four.

Once there, though, they found themselves with the challege of finding a way past Hugo & Charles. Perhaps enjoying the underdog role, Gwydion & Jack played comfortably their best Fives of the day, playing their part in a very high quality game of Fives. The problem for them was that they were up against formidable opponents including the current Kinnaird champion and as well as Gwydion & Jack played, you always felt that Hugo & Charles had an extra gear if they needed it, and they duly came through as 15-9 winners.

The other semi-final looked like it would be an extremely close one on paper, with Prajeeth & Tanish - so impressive in the morning - taking on the wild card pairing of Isaac & Fred. The opening stages of the match went as expected, with the two pairs feeling each other out and staying within a point of each other up to 6-5, at which point the match suddenly turned on a sixpence as Isaac Weaver hit a purple patch of returning and volleying that blew his opponents away. With Fred providing rock solid support, Prajeeth & Tanish had no answers and their challenge unravelled at a rate of knots as 6-5 became 15-5 in no time at all.

The Ipswichian/Harrovian pairing had struggled to get much change out of Hugo & Charles in their morning group game but went into the final buoyed by their excellent win in the last four and getting more used to each as a pairing. Fred & Isaac continued to play well in the final, throwing everything they had at Hugo & Charles, but as with the semi-final against Gwydion & Jack, the defending champions just had too much quality for their opponents, ruthlessly seizing on and punishing anything loose, keeping their own error count to a minimum and both players proving very effective at the set piece. There were some fantastic rallies, some brilliant shot-making and plenty to enjoy and admire for the spectators, but the result was never really in doubt, Hugo & Charles winning 12-6, 12-7 to retain the trophy and give Hugo that record sixth win. The consolation for the others is that both turn 25 this season and neither will therefore be back next year. Who will be able to step up and become the new champions?

While all of this was going on, perhaps the best (certainly the longest and closest!) match of the day was taking place round the back in the Plate final, with Burford & de Caraman Chimay showing great resilience to fight back from losing the first game 12-8 to Drummond & Evans, winning the second 13-12 and then taking the decider all the way before the older pair just about came through 14-12. 

One disappointment was the lack of a women's tournament, with all bar one pair of the potential entrants unavailable. There are plenty of pairs around who could/should be playing and who would make an excellent tournament; we will try again later in the season and it is to be hoped that there is sufficient interest to make it happen.

Our thanks go to Highgate for hosting the tournament, to Advanta Wealth for their ongoing sponsorship and to all of the players who came along and made it such an enjoyable day.

Quarter-Finals

H.Young & C.Plummer beat M.Krefting & T.Seely 15-2

G.Wiseman & J.Pemberton beat A.Benson & A.Vinen 15-13

I.Weaver & F.Prickett beat T.Webster & H.Turpin 15-3

P.Sathiyamoorthy & T.Arjaria beat A.Sivathasan & A.Kumararuban 15-3

Semi-Finals

H.Young & C.Plummer beat G.Wiseman & J.Pemberton 15-9

I.Weaver & F.Prickett beat P.Sathiyamoorthy & T.Arjaria 15-5

Final

H.Young & C.Plummer beat I.Weaver & F.Prickett 2-0 (12-6, 12-7)

Plate A

L.Drummond & E.Evans beat P.de Caraman Chimay & A.Burford 2-1 (12-8, 12-13, 14-12)