Fernwood Girls are National U19 Champions!

In a stunning result, three of our players represented Fernwood School at this prestigious event held at St Catherine's School, Bramley, on 7th/8th April.

The team consisted of Ritika Maladkar, Lavanya Maladkar and Alana Leung.

Here is a match report from their coach and team manager (a man of many talents!), John Crawley:

"An absolutely brilliant achievement by the 3 girls last weekend. I have honestly never seen them play better. I am so proud of them all. To win they had to beat two of the best girls teams in the country, Howells, champions for the last 2 years and North London Collegiate, coached by coaches with at least twice my grade!!!!!

After the games played on the Saturday they were in equal first place with St Paul's on 8 points with Howells third on 7. After the three games on the Sunday they were ahead with 14 points with Howells and St Paul's equal second on 13 points.

With Howells and St Paul's having fairly 'easy' opponents in the last round Fernwood needed 2.5 points to win the tournament but having to play Lady Eleanor School who had caused a number of surprises already. A win from Alana gave the team a good start but then Ritika took a draw with her opponent leaving Lavanya to win her game. In the last game in the tournament and in a blitz finish Lavanya managed a win for the team, giving them the 2.5 points they needed to win the tournament.

Quite nice for the only northern team in the competition to win it!!!!! Fernwood 16.5 pts, St Paul's 16 pts, Howells 16 pts, N.L.C. 'A' 14 pts, Lady Eleanor 10.5 pts, N.L.C. 'B' 7.5 pts, Bromley High 3.5 pts, St Catherine's 0 pts."

A short report with pictures is on the ECF website.