UK Student Archery Association

Saints soar to SSS summit [01/Nov/17]

St Andrews won the opening SSS league match, hosted by neighbours Dundee, by 71 points. Saints' winning tally was 2162, with Edinburgh in second on 2091, despite a 584 from Guy Matzkin. Heriot-Watt, Strathclyde and Dundee were next but were all in the 1900s. Apart from Matzkin, no other recurve broke 560, although there were five in the 550s. Edinburgh did win the novice match with St Andrews in second here. Only 6 of the clubs fielded complete novice teams of 3, although matches in October do come very early in a novice's developement. For the team results in full and table, see SSS 2017/18 page.

St Andrews placed 4th in the league last year, ending their indoor campaign with third placed finishes behind Edinburgh and Napier. The last time St Andrews won an all-SSS fixture however was at the 2002 SUSF Indoor Championships - 15 years ago, although prior to 2011/12, SSS league matches were not all vs all. The last time a club other than Napier or Aberdeen finished runners up to Edinburgh in the SSS league was 2009.

SSS also created a compound league last season, although it did struggle for viability, with only Strathclyde fielding a team of 2 archers more than once. Four sides had two compounds present in this fixture with Edinburgh finishing comfortably clear. In fact Edinburgh's compounders broke 2 All Unis records in this season opener. Sarah Prieels' 591 put one point on her BUCS Indoors 2016 mark, whilst the team total of 1175 (Prieels and Hope Greenwood) was another All Unis record, this time by 11. See the updated All Uni records.

Before any other league has begun, SSS will have two in the bag as Strathclyde host SSS match 2 on 4th November, with NUTC happening in Liverpool on the same day. The first NEUAL league matches, hosted by Huddersfield, Salford and Newcastle take place a week later.

Elsewhere a new club at Bournemouth will join SWWU for 2017/18, which will mean more SWWU attendance records. Bournemouth's Captain is Sarah Shahzad who also took part in Abertay's debut SSS season in 2016/17. SWWU and SEAL will start on the weekend of the 25th/26th November.

For the E-League, Round 1 ended yesterday (31st October), with Round 2 starting today (1st November). Scores for Round 1 can be submitted up to and including the 5th November, with results expected on the E-League website two days after that.