Bridgnorth Endowed U14 boys’ badminton team enjoyed an incredible run at Shropshire School Games’ Badminton Finals held at Shrewsbury Sports Village last month.
The top badminton teams from each district attended, all with ambitions of lifting the trophy and walking away with the winners’ medals.
The competition format required each squad to play all teams from the various regions, with the top two going through to the first and second play-off, and the remaining competing for the third-placed game.
Bridgnorth Endowed decided on their winning strategy from the get-go, and stuck with it throughout with the competition.
Freddie Morris played the first singles game, Nathan Ford and Dan Carter teamed up for the first doubles game, Luca Simpson played the second singles game, Nathan and Freddie joined forces for the penultimate doubles game, and Luca and Dan paired up for the final doubles game of the match.
In the first game, BES faced a strong Adams Grammar team, who made them work for every point. However, all the practice the boys had put in paid off and they finished the match winning 4 -1.
Next up, they played an even stronger Ercall Wood team that featured several county players. Unperturbed and sticking with their game plan, they again won 4 games to 1.
Their final pool game against Wem’s Thomas Adams School provided a stern test, but still Bridgnorth Endowed went on to win the match 4 games to 1.
The boys’ convincing performance saw them claim the top spot from the pool stages and, with the three other teams all winning a match each, it went down to just a few points for Ercall Wood School to secure a place in the final.
With fatigue starting to set in, BES decided to keep going with their strategy, even though Ercall Wood decided to switch to a different approach.
Both singles games were won by only two points for the BES boys but, as in the earlier district rounds, it was their strength in badminton doubles that stood out and led to a convincing 5-0 win.
Congratulations to the boys on a superb result!
