Leeds Met Carnegie thrashed the University of Bath without losing a single match in the BUCS women’s Badminton finals for the Championship and Trophy events held at the EIS, Sheffield.

Leeds Met only lost one game throughout both competitions as their dominance in the event shone through winning 8-0 in each contest.
In the Championship event, Carnegie started the as they meant to go on with straight game victories in both the opening singles matches, played against their alternate seeding.

Carnegie’s number one seed Anita Raj Kaur started the match with a sensational defeat of Bath’s second seeded singles player Lauren New 21-4 21-7.

The following singles match was also a precession for Leeds Met as Sarah Milne eased to a comfortable 21-11 21-7 victory over Nicola Webb.

Leeds’ doubles pairing of Joanne Quay and Lauren Smith continued the onslaught as they disposed of Emily Hollis and Ali Marr 21-9 21-14.

Bath’s biggest challenge to break their opponents 100% record came in the fourth match of the tie as their strongest doubles team of Vicky Primmer and Panouga Rior took their match with Carnegie’s second pair (Alex Langley and Jeslyn Pang) into the third game.

However, after being level at 20-20 at the end of the match the Carnegie pairing held their nerve the better to go two points clear to win the match 21-9 19-21 23-21.

The player of the tournament, Kaur wrapped up the victory and the BUCS Gold in the fifth match of the tie, with another solid and comfortable performance winning the match 21-10 21-5.

In the other reverse singles match Milne completed her second victory outmanoeuvring her tiring opponent Lauren New who suffered a 21-9 21-5 defeat.

In truth, the doubles were much closer affairs in the matches as Bath switched their squad around to put their better singles players in the doubles for tactical reasons.

However this gamble did not pay off for the Southerners as they couldn’t grab a victory in the remaining reverse doubles. The first seeded pairing of Rior and Primmer losing to Quay and Smith 21-14 22-20 and their second string of Marr and Hollis being defeated by Langley and Pang 21-17 21-16.

The Trophy final followed much to the same pattern as the Championship match as again Leeds Met won each individual match against Bath, however this time without losing a game.

Leeds’ singles players, Munn-Tzin Bong and Cristin Callow looked untouchable in both their matches with only Bath’s number one player Jess Hill challenging the former in one individual game that ended 21-15.

The singles successes meant Carnegie got off to the perfect start in the match as Bath again switched up their side to entice closer doubles matches.
However, this tactic came to no avail, even though the Leeds players were made to work hard for their triumph.

Bath came close to disrupting the onslaught in both matches against the Leeds Met second doubles pairing of Charlotte Owen and Lisa Whittaker but the duo were able to hold firm to battle to the success.

The 8-0 victories meant Leeds Met Carnegie won the Championship gold medal for the third year running and the Trophy title for the second consecutive year.

Written by Ed White, BUCS Championships Student Media Team
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