James Rutherford enjoys best best tournament
A great performance from James yesterday at the Newham U17 ranking competition at the University of East London and a frustrating one for Ed.
James kicked off with 5 victories out of 5 in his poule, including a 5-4 win over 2nd seed in the poule, Scotland's Duncan Morrison. Ed started nervously and unexpectedly lost his first fight 3-5. He then won his next 4 fights 5-0 or 5-1. His last fight was against Benjamin Urdzal of Newham Swords on his home turf. With another referee, Ed would have had a good chance of a 5-3 win. Instead he came away with a 3-5 loss. James went into the DEs as equal 6th seed and Ed as 16th.
In L64, James beat Dominic Sampson of Kenilworth Swords 15-1. Ed had an almost equally comfortable 15-7 victory (in practice if not numerically) against Oscar Plant of Millfield. James had to work harder against Matthew Williams of Cardiff in L32, with a 15-11 win. Meanwhile Ed was beating American Benjamin Simmonds of Swindon Fencing Club 15-4.
In L16, James had another comfortable win - 15-3 against Edward Christophers of London's Fighting Fit. Ed faced number 1 seed and top ranked cadet Isaac Jolley. This was so evenly matched all the way through. 6-6 at the first break. 13-13 at the second break. Ed made a breakthough and it was 14-13. Ed was convinced the next hit was his, as were many neutral spectators. The referee called it the other way. Ed then attacked and didn't quite connect but Isaac did. Very frustrating, but as once fellow parent commented, the quality of the fencing on display from both fencers was worthy of a final rather than an L16 match. James then fenced Isaac in L8 and battled hard, but Isaac won through 15-12 - and went on to win the competition, coming back from 5-12 down in the final to win 15-14.
So, from 64 fencers, James was placed 5th and Ed 12th. Both the boys will have made the GB squad for the international competition in Pisa in January. Next up for Ed is the Eden Cup next Friday, an U20 international in London - with a massive 202 fencers. Ed and James then spend the weekend at Millfield School in Somerset, fencing for the East Midlands in the Cadet Winton competition.