View From the Oche -End of Season Report

 

 

Well this is very much delayed End of Season View From the Oche and a pretty shortened version as I have been immersed in work and the World Cup – well done Germany you won me some dosh.. We have some reviews from some of last season’s teams and a round up of the stats aswell. We look at what happened in the off season and include some new photos from last season .Once the leagues are registered we will have a further addition to preview the leagues and make some predictions for the Autumn season.

Captains Reports

Some Captains look back over the Second half and analyse how their teams have performed.

Division 1

Glyn -The Nomads

After an opening match stutter the Nomads first season in division 1 has been a resounding success with us securing 3rd place. This was driven by us only losing one match for the entire second half of the season which included wins against Mabuhay and Team Viet. We are still in the Team KO cup and, fingers crossed, looking forward to doing some real damage as the rounds progress. looking forward to doing some real damage as the rounds progress. Our dedicated group of 6 core players (special mention to Mike who’s stepped in when needed), have all had a solid season with Brett & Glyn on a 9-5 singles record and Chad on 10-4, most impressively we didn’t have a single player throw less than 20 tons. We look forward to the final games of the season and our the Autumn round of matches. Best team performance – Our 7-5 win against the champions in waiting Mabuhay Most impressive opposition player – Guppy, his 11 tons and 6 checks against us was the best darts I’ve witnessed in a long time. Own team MVP – Chad remains our Golden Boy and rounded off the season by taking 2nd place in both tons and checks

Division 2

Aurelius -The Prixx

Second Half Review – The Prixxx by Jiggy (formally known as Aurelius)

WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS – yay! However, we didn’t have it all our own way….

In the first half of the season we played very well at times, but lady luck also helped us as while we were snatching 7-5 victories, the other teams around us were taking points off each other with 6-6 draws. And fortunately, fortune again smiled on us as we beat Dirty Harrys, Pinoy Patriots and No Star Where 7-5. In these games a lot happened. Against Dirty Harrys we found ourselves 2-4 down after the first singles, yet pulled off 5 straight singles victories to edge home in a game that could easily have gotten away from us. We then avenged our previous loss against the Patriots and beat NSW with dramatic team game victories. In particular, The Queen of Darts (Thuy) and Captain Fantastic (Melvin) played vital roles and made crucial checks to see us over the line.

With the title all but secured, unfortunately we didn’t pick up any more wins, with 1 loss and 2 draws from our final 3 fixtures. However, it must be stressed that this was due to some great play from our opponents. The Charmed Assassins lived up to their name by handing us a 4-8 defeat, only our second of the season. The Phukkers gave us another great game as always and their league position was definitely not a reflection of their ability. We hope their fortunes change next season as we always enjoy our matches. Finally, despite Aurelius having to play left-handed due to a broken finger and a thread bare squad, Black Magic failed to vanquish us under their curse and what better place to finish the season than at Voodoo’s!!!!

Division 2 has been so competitive. We could easily have been at the other end of the table had we not found those vital checks at vital times. This season has been super fun and we wish all the other teams the best in August.

With the ever reliable Mel, Thuy, Prixler (Peter), Woz and DT picking up regular wins we are looking in good shape to Prixxx Divison 1. Aurelius and Kevin will be hoping for more consistency at the ochy. We also say farewell to Dr Darts (Moulik) who unfortunately will be leaving Vietnam. Watch out Division 1….you’ve been warned.

Patrick – The Charmed Assassins

Our first game of the season saw us travelling to D7 to take on the guys from Dirty Harry’s, very nice bar, great venue except for one thing, could do with the music turned up, I think nerves hit both teams as not many players from either side threw good darts, it was pretty much an even game all the way through and ended up that, 6-6 the final score 13-13 on legs.next up NSW, at the Cow, NSW took both triples (sets have been our weak point this season), then we took two doubles, only one behind, then we went on to take four single and finally the team game to snatch victory, then something went wrong in the following two league games, Pinoy Patriots beat us 9-3, disaster, only Brian Houx played well that night, turns out most of us had had a stressful day, then we played The Prixx, again disaster, once again losing 9-3, Melvin was on fire that night, having five tons and six checks, no excuses this time, we played crap.

In between these two disasters the first leg of the knock out cup was played, we had drawn, surprise, surprise, a D1 team, Those Guys (since I joined my team we have drawn a D1 team every year in the first round), we did have home advantage though, the guys entered in their usual conservative way and welcomed me to D1.Brian took the first triple and only Russell could win one of the first three singles, 2-2, then we won the first two doubles, 4-2, Those Guys were realising it wasn’t going to be a walkover and actually went quiet for at least five minutes, then then sugar pop and B lo snatched the third 4-3, sugar pops went on to take the singles games from Brian, then I won, then Matt took the third for Those Guys, down to the last triples and I managed to check to win the game, an unexpected result all round I think.

After The Prixx, we hosted Black Magic and had a good victory to restore pride, winning 9-3, followed by a by a 7-5 defeat to Dirty Harry’s, we were at home as well, boo.The following games were swinging either way 7-5, a defeat to Pinoy again but much closer at 7-5.

The next round of the knock out cup saw us with home advantage once again, this time taking on the Vinyl bar unfortunately for them super Mario was in Australia, a break for us, we started of well, winning the first triples game and two singles, 3-1, the Vinyls took two doubles to our one, 4-3, then came the singles, I had drawn Thanh, who had only been playing for a month, you would not have thought so, she took the first two legs, I was staring into the abyss, but somehow I managed to rally and take the next three legs, well played Thanh. Daniel and Tram went on to secure victory.

With few games left to write about we seemed to find our form, hitting a winning streak and gaining revenge on The Prixx, finishing third in our first season for a long time in D2 is great, it was tight at the end with Dirty Harry’s breathing down our necks, well done to the team and thanks to all the teams for some great nights, keep up the good work Jimmish with your blogs.

 

Colin – Phattys Phukkers

The Phukkers had an interesting and … challenging year overall throwing the arrows as we struggled to find a win all season. Coming close, but never quite getting it. A healthy number of draws ending up being our highlight for the season, … except for the stellar performance of Captain Jimish who finished off with a clean 12 – 0 record in the singles. Well done Jimish.

A team with a new look, new name and new faces, the Phukkers had the making of a strong and competitive team but just continuously fell short too many times. That of course did not stop the fun and joy of the matches every Tuesday and hats off to our division competitors for a well played and enjoyable season overall.

Highlights this year would have to have Jimish at the top with that clean record, unmatched by teammates for as long as I know of. Strong performances were seen by all as well here and there with some nights of a hinky curse rearing its ugly head as well, first inhabiting Brownie one night and then Colin the next. We never did quite find out what that was all about, but thankfully it did seem to pass, hopefully never to be seen again. Pam had one of our stellar performances when out of nowhere she produced a near perfect night of darts and five checks against Black Magic.

It looks like the PP will be up against new competitors in a new division for next year (here we come D3), and will do so with a smile on our faces and that is what Tuesday nights is all about.

Phukkers MVP – Jimish without a doubt

Next Season Prediction – Continued end match shots following a great night of darts

 

Adrian – Dirty Harry’s

It was another mixed bag for us in the second half of the season. We were hoping to maintain our position in the league but we didn’t quite manage that. We got ourselves into a possible promotion position with 2 games to go but unfortunately we weren’t ‘ dirty ‘ enough to see it out and also decided we prefer division 2 🙂

The Matches

First up was an away game at one of our old venues against Charmed Assassins. As in most games we started strongly and had a 4-1 lead going into the singles. Charmed are quite a strong team when they all show up, and they won 4 singles ( which were pretty tight ) to make the team game interesting. Luckily Ryan did the business for us and capped off a captains performance on the night with his 6th check. Inspired on his return to his darting home! A good start for us.

Next up was a home game to the prixx. They took the 2 tripples but we came back strongly and won all 3 doubles with the checks been shared around. Looking at the singles match-ups I fancied us to at least break even. Ironically the only game we won was the game I was confident we would lose, I played well for a change and managed to beat Warren ( the highlight of my season ). But the prixx showed why they won the league with a very strong singles performance, Thuy in particular, who was their best player on the night, won the deciding singles to clinch the win for the prixx. She also hit 5 tons and a high check. Devo hit 5 tons for us for the second week in a row. Overall we were disappointed to lose to match. Shite!

Black Magic were next up. I said in the previous report that I wanted to avoid another arse-slapping finale in this game. With our captain away I wasnt confident that we would as we’d never beaten them and i think only ever drawn once in several attempts. Again we started well and found ourselves 4-1 up heading into the singles. Everyone was throwing well and confident we could lift the vodoo curse. Andrew and Dan took the first 2 singles in good style ( Captain Rob 1 suffering a rare loss against us ) hitting a few tons along the way, impressive scoring and checking and devo followed up with a dramatic win over Drama to clinch the win and put us 7-1 up! I won’t mention what happened next but we won the match. Enough said. Our captain shit his pants when he heard the news. Slap that!

Confidence was high ahead of the arrival of phattys phuckers and we were starting to look up the table. It was a good overall performance from us and a 10 -2 win reflected that. Dan was on fire for us again with 5 checks and 5 tons. Singles wins for Ryan, Andrew and Devo meant that we won our singles match-ups 4- 2 for the first and only time of the season! Jimish got a notable win over dave which kept his unbeaten singles run alive ( cannae believe that like! 🙂 ) Happy days!

After a bye week, in which there were some interesting results, we faced an away game against Pinoy Patriots, in a game that if we won, would have seen us in promotion contention. We felt confident that if we performed we could force an upset. We got off to a good start yet again taking the 2 tripples. But for once our doubles pairings didnt click and we lost all 3 to be behind going into the singles. Pinoy were on form and Mike, Rey and Jeorge showed why they are top of the stats charts with convincing wins. Andrew, with a high check and Ryan got singles wins for us. Unfortunately it was another 8-4 loss to Pinoy and meant that we also slipped from 3rd place in the table. Disappointing!

The final game of the season was against No Star Where. Both teams were safe from relegation and there wasn’t much at stake except a bit of pride and that a win for NSW would put them ahead of us in the table. After a very sluggish start NSW were 2 – up and they took 1 of the doubles, Fudgie playing particularly well, to go 3-2 up going into the singles. Looking at the single match – ups I thought we would at least break-even but it was an off night for the dirty’s. NSW took the first 4 singles to clinch the match.Again fudgie was the key man with a good win over dirty dan, despite dirty dan hitting 7 tons, a team record! He probably would have swapped those for a check though 🙂 Ryan and Devo took the last 2 singles and Dave got the final check of the season to make it 7-5. Anticlimax!

It was a bit of a rollercoaster of a season without ever reaching the top or bottom. I think we’re disappointed not to have finished 4th at least, considering we beat and drew with charmed assassins who finished 3rd. We performed well in the team games but our singles have let us down. Only 3 players with favourable win/loss records and thats what has cost us. But our scoring is improving and I think we should be challenging for promotion in the Autumn season.

Most difficult opponent – I think miss Thuy Tran had the best individual performance against us. Definitely the most improved player in the league as well.

MVP – I’m not sure we have one 🙂 Traditionally it would be Ryan with a 7- 3 singles record and he has had a good season. With the stats format we have 2 players tied at the top on points, Dan and Devo, both having equal checks, Dan with more tons and also having played a match less. So DIRTY Dan is our MVP of the season 😉

On a personal note this is my last season. So I just wanted to say it was a pleasure to be part of the darts league for the past 4 years. I met some great people and have a lot of friends and good memories from being a part of it. I will miss the tuesday night nerves and pizza 🙂 I think i got lucky joining the team that I did, a great bunch of guys, and will definitely miss hanging out and being part of that team. Best of luck next season boys. It’s been emotional!

Rob Crowther- Black Magic

View From the Oche – End of Season Report Black Magic

At the midpoint of the season, Black Magic found itself in a spot of trouble at the bottom end of the table. Unfortunately, this situation did not improve and relegation to Division 3 was the result at the end of the season.

The second half started well with a win over NSW and a creditable draw with Pinoy Patriots with a win in the team game coming back from 400 points down! This was followed by a 5-7 loss to Dirty Harry’s, a draw with Phatty’s Phukkers, another 5-7 loss to Charmed Assassins and a final week draw with The Prixxx leaving us well short of safety.

It’s hard to pinpoint exactly where we went wrong, although most of the team would probably put it down to poor captaincy! We lost Tintin for a couple of crucial weeks while Rob 1, Drama and Manneken Pis probably have to bear the brunt of it as experienced players who didn’t produce enough on a consistent basis.

Tintin led the way with a 7-3 singles record for the season. Moore or Less was good support at 6-3, while Porridge came good over the second half of the season to finish with a 6-5 record. Manneken Pis and Rob both ended 5-6 which was disappointing for all concerned!

There was no stand out good or bad performance in the 2nd half. We played at much the same level throughout and never did quite enough to move up the ladder. The highlight of the season was probably that team game victory against the Patriots. It’s not often you can overcome a 400 point deficit to win!

We’re looking forward to finding some form in Division 3 next season and hope to be making a quick return to Division 2. If we have to go down, we’re pleased that it’s with the Phukkers and will look forward to another couple of cracking matches!

Division 3

Shrini – Bernies Best

Bernies Best started the Spring season with bang, winning over top team of Division. And continued good performance in 1^st5 matches with 4 wins. However in further matches lost some very good players due to their own priorities resulting in to some losses, had face saving with return of our ace player Xuan on the dart-board with newly arrived baby-Victoria & renewed energy and 2 good new players Mike & Lakshmi. Though got beaten by all those whom we had beaten in 1^stround!! And side changed, suffered 4 losses. Somehow, started recovering towards end of season and ended up in last 4 matches with 1 draw, 1 loss and wins in last 2 matches and gained 3^rdposition. Had good performance by 6 team members, Kalvin scored 180, & 5 members had high finish which number is also notable record of team in Division 2 & 3. In a way 3^rdposition happened for good!! As such all team mates were very keen to continue in div. 3 for much greater fun & easy going evenings. Hope to continue with just good enough performance in Autumn season league. Guess what? Best wishes & luck to all. Cheers!

 

The Stars of Stats

Division 1

Top 3 Singles Players

1st Nhan [Team Viet] 12- 2

2nd Big Boy [Those Guys] 11-2

3rd Xu [Team Viet] 11-3

 

Top 3 Tons Scorers

1st Xu [ Team Viet] 85

2nd Chad [Nomads] 73

3rd Big Boy[ Those Guys] 72

 

Top 3 Checkers

1st Big Boy[ Those Guys] 45

2nd Chad [Nomads] 42

3rd Xu [Team Viet]  40

 

High Finish

Adrian [Mabuhay] 157

Top 3 Points Scorers

1st Xu [Team Viet] 242

2nd Big Boy [Those Guys] 219

3rd Chad [Nomads] 209

The stats are dominated by three players in  Xu , Big Boy and Chad who are in the top three in nearly every category. Only Adrian and Nhan disrupt their dominance ,with Nhan claiming top spot in the Singles Player section and a mighty impressive 157 High Finish from Adrian. The usual suspects from last year Jun and Jonel from Mabuhay had disrupted seasons and hence failed to repeat their feats of last year.

Division 2

Top 3 Singles Players

1st Jimish [Phattys]  12-0

2nd Rey [Pinoys]      11-1

3rd Peter [Prixx]       10-1

 

Top 3 Tons Scorers

1st Jeorge [Pinoys] 68

2nd Rey [Pinoys]    57

3rd Mike [Pinoys]   44

 

Top 3 Checkers

1st Rey [Pinoys] and Brian [Charmed Assassins] 36

2nd Rob W [NSW] 34

3rd Jeorge [Pinoys] and Jimish [Phattys] 33

 

High Finish

Mike [Pinoys] 125

 

Top 3 Points Scorers

1st Jeorge [Pinoys] 174

2nd Rey [ Pinoys] 170

3rd Jimish [Phattys], Mike [Pinoys] and Woz [Prixx] 125

Second placed Pinoy Patriots are well represented on the leaderboard in all categories with Rey ,Jeorge and Mike appearing regularly. Champions ,The Prixx get on the board with Peter aand Woz ,whilst Jimish managed a good season despite his teams woes of relegation. Brian from the Assassins and Rob W from NSW also manage to get their teams represented on the leaderboard.

Division 3

Top 3 Singles Players

1st Tun [Buddha] 11-2

2nd Rab [Tavern] and Donald [BIA] 11-3

3rd Ken [BIA] 10-1

 

Top 3 Tons Scorers

1st Tun [Buddha] 43

2nd Rab [Tavern], Mario [Vinyls] and Lee [Vinyls]  38

3rd Donald [BIA] 36

 

Top 3 Checkers

1st Tun [Buddha] 45

2nd Rab [Tavern] 42

3rd Mario [Vinyls] 40

 

High Finish

Dan [Dreamtime] 115

 

Top 3 Points Scorers

1st Tun [Buddha] 170

2nd Rab [ Tavern] 165

3rd Paul [ Vinyls] 149

Lie Division 1 ,this Division is domainated by a few players. Tun from Buddha managed a clean sweep in the Top 3 Categories ,as Buddha Bar has a good second half of the season. Rab of the Tavern ran him very close in Points, Singles wins and Checks.  Not surprising to see the Champions, The Vinyls well represented with Mario,Lee and Paul doing well.  BIA’s Donald and Ken also get into the Top3’s after good seasons. And Dreamtime, despite their last place, get to go on the leaderboard through Dan with the highest finish.

The Off Season

Well even though the leagues finished sometime ago it has certainly still been a busy time at oches around the town.

The Mixed Doubles tournament proved popular once again and came up with victors in Mario and Thuong  in what was a closely fought competition. Chairman Lee and his partner Thanh ,should some impressive darts in the early rounds but fell to the impressive winners at the last hurdle.

The annual World Cup Tournament saw the Viets overcome a strong USA team . Favourites for the title All Star Philippines ,fell at the semi stage after looking unbeatable in the group stage.

The Mid Year party takes place this Saturday and we are back at Lion again after a short break.It should be a good occassion to catch up with fellow players and down a few beers.

The Men and Women’s Doubles are due to take place over the next two Tuesday’s -though it will need a late rush of pairs entering to make it worthwhile over two weeks.

The new Autumn Season is upon us in a few weeks and it will be interesting to see if any teams diasappear or new ones come in ,after what was a pretty stable Spring Season ,with all teams completing the season and very few forefeits.