BAL Premiership Match Four
The BAL Men’s Premiership season came to a close at Liverpool on Saturday. WGwEL were in fourth place overall ahead of the fixture, with a mathematical possibility of relegation, which caused some nervousness. Woodford were far from full strength and that nervousness crept in as it was expected that strong teams would be fielded by both hosts Liverpool and Sheffield, who made a relatively short journey for the fixture, and who were the most likely candidates to join the already relegated Kent AC. In the end a combination of some fine individual performances led by Mark Dry in the hammer, and Sam Watts in the 200m, together with some great team spirit led by Alasdair Strange and Heaslon Ihuoma who each competed in four individual events, and some other less than full strength teams, led to an unexpected 3rd place finish on the day. A result that only the ever-optimistic team manger Gladys Bird could have believed was possible. That elevated Woodford to 3rd place overall in the Premiership. Shaftesbury Barnet won on the day with 360 points, to win their first ever overall title, Sheffield on 296 were 2nd from Woodford on 284, Liverpool on 264, Newham 255, Birchfield 226, Sale 226, and Kent 213. Shaftesbury scored 31 League points to win the title, from Newham 22.5, Woodford 20.5, Sale 18, Birchfield 17, Sheffield 16, and the relegated Liverpool on 15, and Kent on 4.
Mark Dry’s fine hammer effort came in a good standard competition. Mark led from Alex Smith, who was somewhat controversially selected ahead of Mark for London 2012, with a 73.29m effort, only for Smith to overhaul that with 73.75m on his last throw. In the “B” hammer, young Peter Clarke, who had travelled from a family holiday to help the team’s cause, produced a solid 53.67m effort for 4th in the “B”. The discus as always was also of a high standard, and Tom Norman had a good competition to place 2nd with 56.04m, ahead of, and in 3rd place, Olympic Games representative Brett Morse. In the “B” Devon Douglas rued a decent foul that landed in the 48m/49m area, and had to be content with 43.73m for 3rd. In the shot, Devon placed 5th in the “A” with 14.59m, and although a somewhat reluctant shot-putter, Tom keen to do his bit to ensure there were no nasty surprises in the overall result, rallied to the cause with his 13.45m for 3rd in the “B”. Alasdair Strange’s four events came in all of the jumps, and such was the timetable that three were going on at the same time, each in separate corners of the stadium. In the pole vault he placed 5th with 3.70m, the high jump 8th with 1.75m, the “B” long jump 7th with 5.84m, and in the one event he was able to concentrate on, the triple jump, he placed 2nd in the “B” with 12.98m (-1.9). Healson Ihuoma, struggled with his run up in his specialist event the long jump, and after two fouls, the first of which was significantly over 7m, he was reduced to “safe” 3rd effort of a modest 6.32m (-3.9), which placed 7th. Normally a reliable high jumper, Healson struggled with a very slippery area of the approach due to earlier rain, and failed to clear a height. He then gamely went over the 110mH where he placed 6th in the “B” with 20.24 secs (+0.5), and later produced a personal best in the javelin of 43.92m for 4th in the “B”, an event where Mark Dry also showed his team spirit in standing in for injured specialists and his 45.83m for 8th still gained valuable points. Chris Awde, once an international decathlete but now the team’s physiotherapist, cleared a very modest 2.10m in the pole vault, but with some others no-heighting that placed him 4th in the “B” and gained more valuable points.
Sam Watt’s fine 200m effort came in the “B” 200m where he won with 21.09 secs w (+3.6), with that wind-reading being somewhat misleading as it was into the athletes faces on the bend. Jordan Kirby-Polidore also had a good 200m as he was 4th in the “A” with 21.43 secs w (+2.2), having earlier found his 100m time of 10.77 secs w (+2.6), only good enough for 7th. In the “B” Sam placed 2nd with 10.66 secs (+2.0). Over 400m and missing usual senior specialists, young sprinter Omololu Abiodun, was drafted into the “A” race, and he was just outside his personal best with 49.53 secs for 7th. In the “B”, junior, Paul Scanlan was 5th with 49.50 secs. The 800m was a tactical affair, and although not at his best having been a little under the weather during the week, Oli Heeks still placed 5th with 1m54.34 secs. The “B”, which was a truer run race, saw a pleasing return from injury for Andy Mariani who placed 2nd with 1m54.06 secs. The 1500m was rather reminiscent of the recent women’s Olympic Games final, but with a quicker (55 secs) last lap, following a 2¾ lap jog. Tom Phillips stayed in contention and a decent position all the way, just losing 3rd on the line as he placed 4th with 3m59.63 secs, as another junior, Ed Shepherd placed 4th in the "B" with 4m05.78 secs. In the 5000m, 1500m specialist, Alex Cornwell made his debut over 12½ laps, and after expending perhaps just a little too much effort mid-race as he led the pack back to the earlier leaders, he was just run out over the last couple of laps, but was pleased enough with his solid debut, 5th in 14m44.84 secs. In the “B” race Peter Matthews in only his 2nd race of an injury truncated season, was still full of running at the end, and his 15m08.31 secs placed a pleasing 2nd. The 400mH saw Francis Smith, who is some way from full fitness, nevertheless happy to gain as many points as able, and he placed 5th with 57.15 secs, and later 6th in the 110mH with 15.22 secs (+ 2.0) In the “B” 400mH, steeplechaser Ryan McKinlay placed a useful 4th with 61.37 secs, just 35 minutes before his main event the 3000m s/ch where he was a good 4th with 9m21.57 secs, as Tomaz Pilbersek placed a fine 2nd in the “B” with 9m32.51 secs.
The meeting finished with the relays and in the 4x100m, and in his fifth event of the day, Healson Ihuoma led off to Omololu Abiodun, Jordan Kirby-Polidore and Sam Watts, who combined well to record a good win in 40.99 secs. The 4x400m team of Paul Scanlan 49.84 secs, Nathan Wake 48.97 secs, Oli Heeks 49.23 secs, and Jordan Kirby-Polidore 48.95 secs, finished 3rd with 3m16.99 secs.
The BAL season finished on a pleasing note, with Woodford 3rd overall, again staying amongst the top three men’s teams in the country. Despite always being very optimistic, Team Manager Gladys Bird was very satisfied but also relieved and very grateful to the athletes who had shown great team spirit both in this and earlier fixtures, in what was a difficult year for club athletics with the fixture list both crowded and complicated by the Olympic Games, and where the very best athletes rightly, at times had their minds focused on bigger matters.