The top two teams in the Braintree Table Tennis League showed their class as they entered the Christmas break by racking up convincing wins in their final two matches of 2024.

Netts A and Rayne A both had wins of 8-2 and 10-0 to increase the gap between second and third places to 22 points.

Both beat Sudbury Nomads 8-2 while Netts took all 10 off their own B team and Rayne did the same to Black Notley A.

Paul Davison, James Hicks and Andy Holmes were on duty in both matches for Netts and it was Hicks, beaten only once before this season, who had a dip in form against Nomads, losing out to both Ken Lewis and Aron Jordan.

They did not have it all their own way against the B team, where they won only four sets in straight games. Fred Evans was leading two games to one against Hicks before missing out in five and both Joe Meleschko and Szczepan Ziobro stretched Holmes to five.

Lewis and Karl Baldwin beat Steve Pennell, playing up from the B team, in Nomads’ 8-2 defeat by Rayne A while Maria Boulton, Adam Buxton and Paul Lucas had little mercy on Notley A.

Rayne B moved above Liberal B into third place by beating them 8-2. In a match where six of the first seven sets went to five ends, Pennell and Victor Chan were unbeaten.

Liberal B fared better against Rayne’s C team, although 5-5 was probably less than they expected. Adam Cuthbert was unbeaten.

In their other match Rayne B dealt with a two-person Liberal C 9-1 although Garry Fryatt can be pleased with a win over Chan, the player who had put that earlier dent in Hicks’ record.

Liberal C also lost 9-1 to Notley A where Mel Cooch, playing up from division two, scored an excellent – and hard-fought – win over Richard Jennings by 3-2 (22-20, 6-11, 9-11, 11-9, 11-7).

The only bright spot for the Liberal club over the two weeks was the first win for their A team, although even that was double-edged, as it came over the B team.

As would be expected, Brandon Crouchman was unbeaten for the A team – although James Mullane stretched him to 11-9 in the fifth – but it was effectively Zak Harrington’s wins over Mullane and Robin Armstrong that turned the match.

Notley B took advantage of Nomads’ two defeats to move level with them in equal fifth place after beating Rayne C 6-4. Luke Burridge was unbeaten for Notley while Keith Martin and new signing Felix Reeve won twice for Rayne.