Thirteen Is The Lucky Number For Cooley & Dunbar
04/03/23: Tom Dunbar & Seb Cooley retained the Kinnaird Cup in association with Advanta Wealth yet again on Sunday with a 3-1 win over Riki Houlden & Hugo Young at Berkhamsted.
S.Cooley & T.Dunbar beat R.Houlden & H.Young 3-1 (15-14, 10-15, 12-7, 12-6)
Watch the match here: GAME ONE GAME TWO GAME THREE GAME FOUR
Berkhamsted Prep School - with its relatively new set of courts - was hosting the Kinnaird for the first time and they did a terrific job welcoming a good sized crowd on a sunny afternoon, who were gathered to watch the latest chapter in the long-running story of Tom & Seb's dominance in the season's premier competition.
They may have sometimes made it appear so, but winning the Kinnaird is most assuredly not easy and there were plenty of challenges for them to overcome this time - a new court, a season and build up disrupted by illness and injury, plus young ambitious, opponents who had had the better of them in the London Tournament earlier in the season.
It was Riki & Hugo who made the faster start in the first game, hitting the ground running and moving quickly out to a 7-1 lead before their opponents began to settle into their rhythm. Once they did, the game settled into a cat and mouse pattern with Tom & Seb gradually reeling their opponents in with Riki & Hugo looking to get over the line before they were caught. They couldn't quite manage it and the catch came at 9-9, but it wasn't decisive, Riki & Hugo repeatedly going one point ahead and Seb & Tom pulling it back all the way to 14-14. Both pairs had a couple of serves at game ball but it was Tom & Seb - having been behind for the vast majority of the game - who struck the decisive blow to take a 1-0 lead.
This was a real test of Riki & Hugo's resolve as they would undoubtedly have felt that they could and possibly should have won the first game, having been in front for most of it, but they showed impressive focus at the start of the second game to keep things tight as the score reached 4-4. All four players were now used to the court and producing some of their best Fives, with the crowd enjoying some fantastic rallies featuring amazing reactions, sensational volleying, retrieving seemingly lost causes and also more subtle skills such as the ability to keep the ball away from their opponents' attack and placing it into a safe part of the court. At 4-4, Seb's glasses came off and broke, causing a break in play while he put his contact lenses in. Whether it was connected or not, he & Tom's level dipped slightly on the resumption and Riki & Hugo took control for the first time since the opening exchanges of game one, opening up 8-4 and 10-6 leads. Again, though, they weren't able to put Tom & Seb away (well it's not an easy thing to do...) and the champions once again pulled it back to 10-10. Unlike the first game, where the score inched its way slowly from 10-10 to 14-14, the end of the second game saw a decisive burst of play from Riki & Hugo to take it 15-10 and level the match at one game all.
The questions at this point shifted to Tom & Seb, to see how they would respond to the loss of the second game. If there were any doubts, they were quickly erased at the start of the third game as Tom & Seb began to shift into the higher gear that we have seen so many times over the years. The mistakes became rarer; the set piece balance began to tilt in their favour; and although there were some epic rallies and some amazing shotmaking from Riki & Hugo, it was noticeable that Tom & Seb were the ones who were beginning to kill the ball more effectively, finding the hole and the bottom of the buttress more than they had in the first two games and more than their opponents were doing, for all of their eye-catching play. This time it was Tom & Seb's turn to head out into a 7-1 lead and despite a recovery of sorts from Riki & Hugo they were always in control as they converted the early lead into a 12-6 win and a 2-1 lead.
The pressure was now back on the shoulders of Riki & Hugo. Could they find a response in the fourth game and test Tom & Seb's ability to maintain their form into a fifth? The fourth game divided itself into three phases - another opening burst from Tom & Seb to start with and a 6-1 lead followed by an impressive reaction from Riki & Hugo to pull it back to 6-5 in a passage of play that featured some of the longest and most spectacular rallies of the match with all four players aware that the match was at a stage where either a purple passage or a drop in intensity from either pair could prove decisive. Riki & Hugo were throwing the Fives equivalent of the kitchen sink at Tom & Seb in the middle of the fourth game, but the champion pair responded as champions do, not giving an inch and eventually making the decisive break themselves, going from 7-6 to 10-6. Again their ability to finish the rally and kill the ball when a chance (or sometimes even just half a chance) presented itself proved to be the difference and the fourth game was won 12-7 to give Tom & Seb a 3-1 win.
This was a tremendous match, with Tom & Seb having to show all of their quality and tap into all of that acquired knowledge of how to win these big games. Riki & Hugo (in his first Kinnaird final) can be proud of the way they played and the way they fought and will no doubt be back again next year, determined to get their hands on the trophy.
Anyone who has watched Tom & Seb play during the course of their ongoing thirteen year winning streak will need no further explanation here of their quality as a pair. Just head to the EFA's YouTube channel and watch some of those games back (this year's final will be up there soon!). It is worth just reiterating the numbers, though, which are scarcely believable: a 22nd consecutive final and a 19th win for Tom in a run that stretches back to 2002. A 13th win in a row for Tom & Seb as a pair and they are of course still unbeaten as a pair in the Kinnaird Cup. Simply astonishing and we should consider ourselves lucky to be able to watch them play.
A final thought - one of the magical things about Fives as a sport is watching four players take part in the most important match they can play in, that they all desparately want to win and seeing them all play in the most perfectly sporting and generous way. All four players lived up to this ideal impeccably during the course of the final - a great example to all those watching and something we should all aspire to.
Our thanks go to Anthony Theodossi and everyone at Berkhamsted School for doing such a terrific job hosting the final to Advanta Wealth for their continued sponsorship and to Chris Davies and Denys Firth for presenting the prizes.
