Waverley Club November 8th

Recreation, temperance and education are like a three-legged stool – remove one and the enterprise would collapse. Healthy relaxation is necessary to social welfare, temperance crucial to averting the worst excesses, and education fundamental to development. Surely these criteria are crucial to the well-being of institutions the length and breadth of the country.

The Club Institute Union aka the CIU, is one such institution, steeped in these traditions, generation after generation of working men have laid the foundations of their own institutions with these fundamentals the tools from which they are built.

These were once the heart beat of community spirit, thriving establishments providing relief for the working man from the stresses of everyday life. These were places that sold more than just beer they sold life, pints of it, whole communities drunk on it, they supped from it's tankard and they fed from it's table.

The Waverley Club, Waverley Road, St.Albans. Situated not far from the site of St.Albans' once great hospital. This club epitomises the decline of these institutions over the years. The three-legged stool has long since been kicked away and lays broken in the corner. The jukebox still spews out 1980's hits, a stark reminder from when this club was once buzzing with locals regurgitating stories about the price of beer pre-decimalisation. Cheesy duo's worked the stage on a Saturday night as the local Lotharios tried there best with the female lead. All this is a world away from today's working men's clubs.

The newly promoted Waverley Club is just an empty shell now, filled with the ghosts of years gone past, echoing to the eerie silence it now produces. Gone are the working men rattling out the fives and threes, gone are the bar hangers, the scourge of every social club committee across the land who have tried year after year to stop such gatherings so that they may have clear passage to refill their glass. Oh how they must long to do battle like that again. Gone too are the beer swilling dart teams, replaced by a new breed of J2o sipping athletes!! Of course their are some exceptions.

With clear passage to the bar the Rose & Crown marched into their hosts venue with an arrogant swagger but they didn't have it all their own way as the hosts twice came from behind to level things up at two a piece after the doubles. In truth though the Rose contributed to their own downfall with a succession of missed opportunities. Going into the singles the Rose were clear favourites and after father and son team of Chris and Tom Wilson had wrapped up impressive victories to stretch into a 4-2 lead it was up to the under pressure Neil "The Dude" Crosby to close out the match. It was a struggle but Neil finally limped over the finish line to seal a victory that was never in doubt. Closing down on Neil Crosby's ever increasingly shaky singles position is Paul Mullins who continued his comeback with an impressive 2-0 singles victory which included his first maximum of the season to wrap up a 6-2 victory.