QUEENS F trail Aldworth B by 13 points at the top of Basingstoke and District Table Tennis League Division Two after a well-contested 5-5 draw with AWE A.

Queens will hope that soon-returning star Kam Pang will reignite their title chase.

Bill Stamatiou, affectionately known amongst his side as ‘Greek Bill’, earned a hard-fought treble including a five-game win in the match of the night against George Wilson.

But Wilson managed his own five-game thriller in the final match against Melvyn Lovegrove after quickly stretching into a two-game lead. Perhaps with the daunting shadow of scoring zero, Lovegrove managed to reel Wilson back to tie.

Eventually, the effort proved insufficient as Wilson won the deciding game 14-12.

Steve Redstall took a double for his Portals side as they faced a two-man St Peters C missing Tom Speed.

The pivotal match-up proved to be that between Redstall and defensive style arch-nemesis Alan Lipscombe, which saw the Portals player emerge victorious in five games.

Richard Faulkner also managed a double, albeit against three players, with commendable wins over Peter Blunden and Gary Walters.

A Queens E team missing Nigel Cooper, due to the recent snow conditions, had to call on the services of Bill Bavister. This proved a waste of time – in the opinion of the home scorecard comments – as they lost 8-2 to their fellow Queens G side.

Robin Burns took the only treble of the fixture and appears the player in form with seven wins from his last nine matches. Celia Hooker spared the blushes of Queens E with defeats of Tommy Wan and George Freeman.