The first development league match last night was a resounding success. Congratulations and many thanks to everyone concerned. Vodafone - a completely new team to the BVA; Maidenhead - lots of new faces, and Newbury - with six juniors, aged 10 to 15. The games were played in exactly the right spirit for the development league - competitive but friendly.

Thanks in particular to James from Vodafone for all his work and commitment in starting a team from scratch; Karina from Maidenhead for all her encouragement and help from the scorer's desk, and the Chris Whitehead who acted as Newbury's coach, and orchestrated a total of ten substitutions superbly.

The "variable strictness" refereeing worked well, but we arehappy too receive comments and suggestions, as we are still learning how to make the most of the development league. The technical timeout also seemed to work well, but again we would welcome any comments.

Several comments were made about playing to 15 instead of 25. The total time of three hours was quite tight, and that was without any games going to a third set. We have a month before the next fixture, so perhaps we can discuss modifications to the format/rules and implement them in the forthcoming fixtures. Perhaps the match should start as soon as possible when the first two teams are present. If teams would rather play to 25, maybe we could play only two sets, and allow the concept of a "draw". Let's discuss it over the next week or so, and make decisions for future fixtures.

For the record, Vodafone beat Newbury 15-10, 15-7; Newbury beat Maidenhead 15-12, 15-13 and Vodafone beat Maidenhead 15-13, 15-13. E Stevens of Maidenhead won player of the match twice, and 14 year old Will Lockyear of Newbury won the other player of the match.