Lancaster Morecambe Badminton League - Cup Match

Tonight (or morning rather) is quite a tragic day for many people. Bailrigg A is playing against Ingleton A at away in a cup match. It's a knockout tournament and Ingleton A is currently in Division One. It's a bit different than a league match format in term that you win the match based on total points rather than total sets. So winning 15-0 will be a big advantage than winning 15-13. And lower ranked team will get an additional points which is known as handicap points.

Paul and I lost both our sets for the first time in this season by the score of 11-15, 12-15. Wan Huzaini, who is playing for the first time in A team, and who will be playing in Ingleton again this Wednesday for B team, is my second double partner and we also lost both our sets 11-15, 9-15. He managed to break his racket this time, the fourth time this year if I'm not mistaken. So it's a tragic day for him. Brenda and I also lost both our sets 12-15, 5-15. Overall we only managed to get 154 points against 258 points won by Ingleton A. Even when we received an additional 80 handicap points, the difference is too great to make any difference. So a tragic day for Bailrig A for being kicked out from the cup tournament.

But nothing compare to what happened to one of the Ingleton A members. As Wan Huzaini and I went inside Brenda's car, we noticed that the time was 11.30pm and the temperature is -2 Celcius. It was very cold and frost started to form on the car's windscreen. We began our journey home along the village and farm little winding roads. The journey was quite long as Ingleton is actually situated in Yorkshire district. Brenda was driving within the speed limit (30mph, although I had a suspicion that she drove a little bit more than that) when we came accros some icy patch on the road. Apparently there was a little stream of water running accross the road and it just went frozen. The car wobbled a bit when we passed through it but when we look further in front we suddenly realised that there is a car lying upside down next to the road. We stopped immediately and Paul's car who was following us also stopped.

Brenda, June and Sue immediately went to that car and to our horror, the driver was one of the Ingleton A ladies player as we found a badminton kit and the score sheet. I think the ladies knew the driver and they suspected that it was Rosie but it was quite dark and they just can't see the driver's face clearly. She was unconscious and therefore did not respond to our call. The driver area was quite crushed and Sue can only reach for her hand. She thought that she can feel a faint pulse. We immediately called the rescue and wait for the help to arrive. There is nothing that we can do except positioning our cars in such a way that other drivers coming into that direction will take an extra care when passing that icy patch on the road.

Two fire engines, an ambulance and several police cars arrived after 10-15 minutes and they immediately went into action. The policeman took our statements and after 10 minutes we are allowed back to our car. On the way back to Brenda's car, I noticed that the firemen have already extracted that driver out of the car but they just laid her down and cover her face with a white cloth. Only then I realised that she is already dead as the paramedics did not try to rush the victim back to their ambulance.

When Brenda started her car again, the time is already 12.30am and the temperature has dipped to -4 Celcius. It was a very slow journey back home and it was a very tragic night.