Veterans League
Review of the Veterans 10-Man League Divisions 1 & 2 matches played on Tuesday 8 August
Four of the bottom six teams in Division 1 won their Tuesday fixtures as Marsh United 'A', Waterloo, Elland C&BC and Longwood all raised their hopes of avoiding the drop.
The top two teams in Division 1 both lost and four of the bottom six won in this week's fixture programme as things hot up at both ends of the table. The leaders, Golcar Lib 'A' lost 3-6 at Kirkheaton Con 'A' and Rastrick missed out on closing the gap to the leaders when losing 4-5 at home to Clayton West. That means that the Golcar side have lost 3 of their last 5 matches and Rastrick have lost 3 of their last 4 and next week the two meet at Golcar.
That win for Clayton West, their 6th in their last 7 matches, pushes them up to third place and Kirkheaton Con's win moves them up one place to 5th spot. Sandwiched between them sits the Lowerhouses team after they went down 4-5 at Elland C&BC.
Elland being one of the four teams in the bottom six at the start of the day to win this week and they were rewarded with a move up of one place but remain within 4 points of the third relegation place. As do Waterloo despite their 8-1 home win over Lockwood Con 'A' who themselves are entrenched in a relegation battle. An 8-1 away win over Milnsbridge 'A' was a 5th successive win for Marsh United 'A' and saw them pass the Lockwood team into 7th place and fast moving out of the drop zone where they were 3 weeks ago.
Longwood had an important home win over one of their relegation rivals when seeing off Meltham 7-2 but remain in a relegation place despite making that 3 wins on the bounce. With a number of bottom half confrontations scheduled the race to stay in the top division is hotting up and with a likely three teams to be relegated the threat reaches half of the teams in the division.
Half of the six Division 2 fixtures ended in 9-0 home wins this week with Shepley, Linthwaite Hall and Thongbridge 'A' being victorious. In fact it was a second consecutive whitewash win for Shepley having done the same to Thorpe Green last week. They were only denied a move to the top of the table by a resilient Netherton Con 'A' team who ended Broad Oak 'A's 100% home win record when beating them 7-2 on their own turf. The gap between the top two is not just 2 points and next Tuesday the top two face each other at Netherton.
The whitewash win for Linthwaite Hall moved them out of the bottom four which is the likely drop zone and they are replaced by Thorpe Green who were on the wrong end of that result. That was a second consecutive 0-9 defeat for Thorpe Green who now sit in that relegation set of 4 teams. Things are looking brighter for the Thongsbridge 'A' side as well after a big 9-0 win over Hemplow 'A' although they remain in 8th place but now 12 points ahead of the relegation places.
A big setback for Lindley Lib 'A's hopes of returning to the top division after losing 3-6 at Bradley & Colne who were only winning for the second time in their last 11 matches.
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