A view from the edge - Report from Main Team Manager Matt Waldie

Life has just got a bit tougher for Eastern Region, as a good couple of days’ petanquing has got us back in the First Division. It was a very good all-round performance, with every team managing at least 4 wins. We have a saying north of the Tweed, “mony a mickle maks a muckle” (ie “a lot of little things combine to make a big thing”) which is just the case here – every team pulling its weight, and the cumulative effect was we came very close to winning the Division Two championship.

In keeping with any competition, there were moments of luck/bad luck, inspiration/stupidity, and other, extraneous factors … such as the variations across 90 or so pistes and, of course, the weather, which was a customary West Country mixture of rain, wind and showers, all day, both days. There were good results and bad results for most teams, but everyone “kept calm and carried on”.

As manager, you spend a lot of time wandering around the terrain, asking inanely “winning or losing?” and – on the Sunday at least – doing your sums, to see how we’re faring against everyone else. What impressed me was the enthusiasm of all our teams – not just for their own games, but for the region as a whole. I was constantly being asked, from the very first round of matches, how we were doing, etc.

Coming second was a good achievement, and everyone is looking forward to the challenges posed by next year’s competition, but to me what I’ll remember best is the team spirit everyone showed – the best yet that I’ve seen, these past few years.