There are table tennis venues. There are proper, traditional table tennis venues. And then there is Kingsley Park Working Men’s Club.
A small dancefloor. Carpet that appears to have survived several generations of local league players. Chairs that offer the traditional British sporting experience of wondering whether you’ll make it through the evening without going through one.
And there, suspended above the table like the crown jewel of Northamptonshire nightlife, hangs a disco ball.
No lasers. No smoke machine. No dance instructor. Just a mirror ball watching over another Premier Division fixture and quietly wondering when somebody is going to put a record on.
The Kingsley Royals brought the venue. Bugbrooke Badgers brought Nick Howard, Craig Brown and Adrian Piotrowski.
The result? Kingsley Royals 0–10 Badgers A. By the end, the only thing the Royals had managed to claim was one solitary game. At least the disco ball still belonged to them.
Chris Stone and the victory that refuses to go away
Chris Stone is a left-handed joker with an exceptional talent for turning one table tennis result into an apparently unlimited supply of conversation.
He also possesses a very specific piece of sporting history.
On 28 September 2023, in what Nick remembers as the Badgers’ very first match, Chris beat El Capitan. According to Nick, it remains Chris’s only victory over him.
If you haven’t heard about it, don’t worry. Chris will tell you.
And then he will probably tell the next person as well.
Their latest encounter was another opportunity to revisit the glory days, although the scorecard offered little prospect of a repeat. Howard won 11–6, 11–7, 11–7, completing a straight-games victory.
Unfortunately, the net decided that Chris had suffered enough already.
A quite extraordinary collection of net cords went Nick’s way during the evening, particularly against his old adversary. It became less a game of table tennis and more a prolonged series of apologies occasionally interrupted by rallies.
“Sorry, Chris.”
Another net.
“Sorry again, Chris.”
By the third game, the word sorry was getting considerably more exercise than either player.
The Clubhouse Nets & Edges Department has declined to investigate on the grounds that there is insufficient evidence of Howard having done anything deliberately clever.
Chris may have lost the match, but 28 September 2023 remains very much available for future conversation.
The first all-Clubhouse showdown
One of the evening’s more interesting encounters involved Lewis Copp and Craig Brown.
Regular readers will recognise Lewis as the new captain of Greenleys Glory in Milton Keynes: an improving all-rounder who likes retreating from the table, retrieving apparently finished points and generally refusing to accept that the rally is over.
Tonight he was representing Kingsley Royals in Northampton. Same Lewis. Different league. Apparently one set of fixtures isn’t enough.
With public Clubhouse membership newly open, Lewis and Craig also supplied what Nick believes was the first singles match between two Clubhouse members.
A historic moment for the international community. Two members, one table, and absolutely no obligation whatsoever to be nice to each other.
Craig, known to his admirers as The Postman, took the first two games 11–7 and 11–6. Lewis responded with an 11–8 third, becoming the only Kingsley player to take a game all evening.
A small victory for competitive balance. A minor administrative irritation for the Badgers’ Clean Sheet Protection Committee.
Craig promptly shut the door with an emphatic 11–3 fourth game.
The first all-Clubhouse encounter: a 3–1 delivery from the Postman. Welcome to the community, Lewis. Lovely to have you.
Ben Aldridge: full throttle, no reverse gear
Ben Aldridge brings a different kind of problem to the table: pace, ambition and a firm belief that defensive rallies are largely optional.
A right-handed, aggressive attacker, Ben is dangerous when the shots start landing. He likes to dictate, not negotiate.
Against this particular Badgers trio, however, the shots did not translate into rubbers. Nick, Craig and Adrian all won in straight games.
The results were severe, but the attacking intent was clear. There will be plenty of evenings when that ambition makes life decidedly awkward for opponents who give him even the smallest opening.
For now, Ben can at least take comfort from the fact that Kingsley’s disco ball had a much longer night than the Royals’ points tally.
Cue Ball and the art of being completely unreasonable
Adrian “Cue Ball” Piotrowski had evidently looked at the evening’s surroundings, admired the overhead entertainment and decided that the most efficient course of action was to win everything before somebody suggested dancing.
Against Lewis, the Polish Pistol won 11–2, 11–5, 11–8.
Against Ben: 11–6, 11–3, 11–4.
Against Chris: 11–7, 11–6, 11–3.
Nine games played. Nine games won.
Adrian’s only apparent concern was whether the disco ball might reflect the glare from his increasingly polished head and interfere with the lighting.
It did not.
Another three singles wins duly entered into the book. The Polish Pistol continues to operate with the efficiency of somebody who has never once felt the need to add unnecessary drama to a straightforward evening.
El Capitan, the Postman and a suspiciously short evening
Nick completed his own singles hat-trick without dropping a game: three against Lewis, three against Ben and three against Chris.
Lewis came closest to taking one, pushing the third game to 12–10. The rest of Howard’s singles scores stayed comfortably on the right side of eleven.
Craig also dispatched Ben and Chris in straight games, adding two more wins to his evening and ensuring that Lewis’s solitary game was the entire extent of Kingsley’s success at the individual-game level.
It was a welcome return to normal service for the Postman following his recent complaint about atmospheric conditions at Greenleys. No breeze was formally reported at Kingsley, although the furniture probably comes with its own environmental risk assessment.
The headband, meanwhile, continued its increasingly successful publicity campaign. Nick maintains that it looked excellent under the disco ball. The Clubhouse has yet to find an independent witness willing to comment.
Doubles: Sweden takes the night off
With Dom Barker absent, the self-appointed Waldner-and-Persson doubles dynasty was temporarily unavailable. Fortunately, Nick had Adrian to call upon.
The pair faced Ben and Chris and won 11–8, 11–4, 11–5, completing the tenth and final rubber without the slightest threat of a Swedish diplomatic incident.
Dom, who continues to claim the role of Jan-Ove Waldner in his partnership with Nick, may wish to note that El Capitan appears capable of finding alternative international representation when required.
We await the official response from Stockholm. Or Bugbrooke. Whichever comes first.
The Clubhouse verdict
Kingsley Royals 0. Badgers A 10.
The Badgers were clinical: ten rubbers won, nine in straight games, and just one game conceded all evening.
But the score tells only part of the story. Chris Stone supplied an enduring rivalry and several years’ worth of first-fixture nostalgia. Ben Aldridge showed the aggressive instincts that can make him extremely dangerous when the shots are landing. Lewis Copp provided both genuine resistance and a small piece of Clubhouse history, linking two local leagues in one evening.
For Bugbrooke, Nick, Craig and Adrian each collected three singles victories, with Nick and Adrian adding the doubles. Across the four Badgers scorecards featured in the Chronicles so far, that’s 38 rubbers won from 40.
Still, the lasting image of the night will not be the scoreline.
It will be a classic working men’s club dancefloor, a magnificent disco ball, a table tennis table beneath it and Nick Howard apologising to Chris Stone for yet another net cord.
The Badgers had all ten points. Kingsley still had the best lighting.