Benji Batten wins Northern Phoenix tournament

Original post can be found on the Northern Phoenix Facebook page here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/780610992079187

Another fun evening of WASPA competition was held on Tuesday the 26th March as what originally began as a field of 10 competitors (leading into the tournament) quickly dwindled down to 6 as players started dropping like flies due to a variety of reasons (injuries, transport etc.). At this point it should be noted that the nation's Table Football Ethics Department (TFED) has been commissioned to investigate the legitimacy of all these 'alleged' claims for non-attendance.

Nevertheless, our Games Logistics Manager (GLM) was able to quickly scramble and re-arrange the format of the event into a regular round robin. This saw every player compete against one another once (in a FAST-15 match) before the event transitioned into a single round final series (based on standings) to determine final placings. The final round also saw the games played in two 10 minute halves.

There was a great deal of action and excitement throughout the evening even though there was the customary littering of 0-0 score lines. Carl Young and Benji Batten played the game of the night in a thrilling 2-2 encounter (during the round robin phase) whilst the three competing Northern Phoenix players couldn’t be separated in any of their ‘intra-club’ matches.

The event was temporarily halted as a local magpie managed to get past security and into the playing arena, dodging broom sticks, cricket bats and stumps before safely managing to escape via one of the hastily opened windows.

In what we hope will be the first of many appearances, new boy George Theocharis put in an admirable shift learning a lot of new skills, tactics and rules along the way. There’s no doubt that all Melbourne Table Football Clubs will be fighting to gain his lucrative signature and bolster their club squads ahead of next year’s Asian Cup and Australian Grand Prix – Watch this Space!

In the Grand Final, Benji and Carl once again couldn’t be separated in normal time and the sudden death penalty shout-out saw the former take Title honours. It was a similar story in the Third Place Play-Off as Beth Eveleigh kept her cool to beat team-mate Christos in shots.

It was the Polish Predator in February, the Brighton Boy in March……..Who’ll take the honours in April?

Another enjoyable evening and needless to say.......