All-England Badminton Championships 2010

Myself, Padraic, Anthony and Derek were lucky enough to travel to the National Indoor Arena in Birmingham last weekend to the 100th All-England Badminton Championships. We were there for Friday's quarter finals, Saturday's semi's and Sunday's exciting finals.

There are few words to describe the unbelieveable experience it was to witness such outstanding badminton in Singles, Doubles and Mixed...we were simply blown away!

The icing on the cake for us was meeting Lee Chong Wei, the World's No. 1 Mens Singles Champion, at the airport on the way home and having an opportunity to speak to him and get a little insight into what it takes to make a World Champion Badminton player. He was a very nice down-to-earth guy and his coach was happy to share some tips with Padraic.

It will go down as one of the best badminton weekends ever and we all took a lot away from watching the pros in action at the Championships, we look forward to making this trip again someday!

This weeks League Update...

Division 7 have now played three of their four matches in the league and have beaten all of their opposition so far. They took 5 of 7 games against Four Roads on our home courts last week. It's a fantastic performance for a team of players, most of whom are, just starting out in competition..well done lads, keep it going!


Division 6 likewise are nearing the end of their 2010 league and remain unbeaten through all their matches to date. In the past week they took all 7 games in a match against Ballinaheglish at home and just last night 6 of the 7 games against Four Roads away. Their unbeaten campaign and comprehensive scores mean they are very likely to be heading to a County Final in April.

Division 5 had a game cancelled on them last week so still have only played one of their four matches but they are due out again in an away encounter against Ballinaheglish tomorrow night so best of luck to them with that.

A further update will follow in about a weeks time.....so stay tuned!

This weeks League update...

Division 7 had their second outing last night when they played away in Ballinaheglish and they again overcame their opponents with a 4-3 victory. Well done to everyone on the team, it's always a great result to get the win but an "away" win is even more impressive still!

Division 6 have now played 6 of their 10 matches and continue their winning streak. They had another comprehensive win at home last night against a very good Glinsk team. There will be two more matches to play next week so another update will follow then. Well done Division 6!

Division 7 starts...

Division 7 in Roscommon is a newly formed league and Boyle had their first match last night.

The Boyle team played at home against Ballinaheglish and on their first league outing secured a home win. There were some very good, closely fought encounters during the match and Boyle did very well to overcome the Ballinaheglish challenge.

Congratulations to all who played last night.

Congrats to Wendy & Mel

A huge CONGRATULATIONS to Mel and Wendy on their recent participation in Today FMs Shave or Dye event with Ray D'arcy in Dublin in aid of the Irish Cancer Society.

I have a "before" shot of the girls here.....

and located an "after" shot of Wendy but not Mel....yet!!

I know some club members already sponsored the girls however for such a worthy cause there may be some more who would like to donate and I have no doubt they'll be happy to accept support at any time.

Well done ladies, we're very proud of ye!

Roscommon Success in Inter County

On Sunday 14th February, the Roscommon County team competed in Group 2 of the Inter-County Class 4 competition in the University of Limerick, the team included a number of our Boyle players.

They had a great outing and emerged second in their group, which comprised Cork, Waterford, Wexford and Sligo, to qualify for the Inter-County Finals in Galway Lawn Tennis Club at the end of March. The Roscommon team won all of their matches but were just pipped to first place by Waterford who had taken more sets from their opponents than Roscommon had.

Well done and congratulations to the whole team and particularly to our own club members, Padraic, John, Mandy, Ruth, Bernie and Sean.

League Update

Division 5 kicked off their league campaign in Ballaghadereen last week with a 4-3 victory over the home team. There were some very close games in the encounter so emerging with an away win was a great result.

Division 6 have played three matches at this stage and are holding their own in all, since the first successful game against Dysart they have overcome the Strokestown challenge in both the home and away legs.