Isle of Man 1 enjoyed a double success in their second county badminton weekend of the season in Newcastle to remain unbeaten.

They got off to a fantastic start against Northumberland 2 on Saturday morning with three men’s singles wins in straight games for Tobey Cheng (21/9 21/16), Alex Buck (21/15 21/15) and Chris Nicholson (21/18 21/17).

Jess Li kept the momentum going with a comfortable 21/8 21/5 women’s singles victory.

At second, Leah Brennan was narrowly beaten 19/21 after a long first game, Northumberland also taking the second.

First on court in the men’s doubles were Matt Nicholson/Cheng who were always in control, winning their match 21/11 21/15, followed by Steven Quayle/C. Nicholson who also won convincingly 21/6 21/17.

J. Li/Philippa Li had a great win to take first women’s 21/14 21/12, with Mia Kirk/Emma Nicholson losing out to a strong Northumberland pair in two games.

First mixed saw a win for Northumberland, but at second mixed Buck/P. Li took the first game 21/18. The home side fought back to take second, and the deciding game was very hard-fought which Buck/Li winning 23/21 to secure an 8-3 victory for IOM1.

The second match of the day was against Lancashire 4 and once again IOM1 took a 3-0 lead after the men’s singles.

Cheng dropped the first game then fought back to convincingly win his next two. Buck played some composed badminton to win his match 21/15 21/16, C. Nicholson battled very well to win his match 21/17 in the third game, with the first two games halved and decided by a couple of points.

J. Li once again showed her class when cruising to a 21/8 21/2 victory at first women’s singles.

Brennan took a comfortable win in the first game of second women’s singles, but the Lancashire player edged the second one 22/24. Leah kept the pressure on throughout the deciding game to take it 21/14.

First men’s doubles was once again won by Cheng/M. Nicholson, with Quayle/Nicholson narrowly losing out in three games at second.

Both women’s doubles pairings played some excellent badminton to win their matches in straight games, with J. Li/P. Li winning at first 21/18 21/11 and Kirk/E. Nicholson taking second 21/14 21/16.

Last on court for the day was the mixed doubles with both matches going the full distance of three games.

At first, M. Nicholson/Kirk came back well to take the opening game 22/20, then lost out in the second. However, they took control of the deciding game from the beginning to win 21/12. Second mixed followed a very similar pattern with Buck/P. Li taking first game 21/17 before losing a close second game to take it into a third game.

After being down at the change of ends at 11, Buck/P. Li dominated the latter part of the game to win 21/15 to confirm a resounding 10-1 success for the island.

Overall, it was an excellent day of results and all-round team performance with all the players gaining wins, meaning IOM1 are unbeaten going into the final county weekend and in with a good chance of promotion.

l The last county weekend for IOM1 and IOM2 teams is on March 26-27 where the teams will play three matches each. Both are in contention for promotion.