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2011 EFA Trophy Qualifiers

Always one of the highlights of the Fives calendar, the EFA Trophy qualifying rounds took place yesterday. With 13 teams entered again this year, the tournament had to be split between two venues, with one group playing at Eton and the other at Harrow. In the end, it was the four top seeds who made it through to the semi-finals in three weeks time, but there was much more to the day's Fives than just the question of who qualified.

It was great to see the EFA Ladies entering a side for the second year in succession in preparation for their entry into Division 3 of the League next season; as happened last year, they acquitted themselves extremely well, taking several points off the other teams and pushing all their opponents hard. It was also good to see strong sides from both Oxford and Cambridge involved and also to welcome back the Old Citizens into the competition to reinforce their resurgence as a club this year. The Citizens, the Wulfrunians, Berkhamsted, the Olavians and the Salopians all took the opportunity to give current schoolboys a taste of adult Fives, which can only benefit each of those clubs in the long run.

Possibly the biggest success of the day, however, was the appearance of a school team from RGS High Wycombe in the Harrow group. Just a few months after the relaunch of the game at this venue, their performances spoke volumes for the enthusiasm for the game being generated at the school. Impressively led by Robert Wilson and Matthew Noyes, the school team managed to claim a couple of scalps during the course of the day and were involved in several close games. We hope to see a lot more of them in the future! For the record, the final group standings were as follows:

Group A (Eton)

1 Berkhamsted A 17

2 Old Salopians 15

3 Old Olavians 11

4 Oxford University 9

5 Windsor & Eton 6

6 EFA Ladies 4

7 Berkhamsted B 1

Group B (Harrow)

1 Old Wulfrunians 14

2 North Oxford 12

3 Cambridge University 7

4 Old Citizens 5

5 Old Ipswichians 5

6 High Wycombe 2

The semi-finals will take place at Eton on Feb 20th and will see Old Wulfrunians take on Old Salopians and Berkhamsted against North Oxford.

Thanks to Mark Yates for running the Harrow group and Mark Williams, Seb Cooley and Graham Dunbar for their help at each venue.