UK Student Archery Association

Surrey take SEAL title [07/Mar/23]

Following the results from SEAL match 5, Surrey claimed the senior SEAL crown, with East Anglia second and Southampton third. East Anglia won the SEAL novice title for the first time. Elsewhere Dundee won SSS match 5 and the SSS Indoor Championships. Sheffield won the BUCS Qualifying leg of NEUAL. The SSS results will both be reviewed separately.

Heading in to match 5, Surrey held a two point lead over East Anglia. UEA needed to beat Surrey by either 3 places or by 2 places and 45 points. Imperial and Southampton were also not far behind. Shooting on the Saturday, East Anglia scored 2134 and could only sit and wait. On Sunday afternoon, Southampton went top in the match with 2169. Surrey did not shooting until the Sunday evening, but when they did, they scored 2137 - not enough to win the match outright but enough to finish ahead of UEA and to add a little gloss on the margin of victory in the final table. Brunel grabbed 4th in the match on 2104.

Top scorer in the match - and the anchor of her team for much of the season - was Imogen Newby (Surrey) who knocked in a 581. Across 5 matches, Newby's scores ranged from 572 to 583. Just behind her, the leading gent in the match was Min Seok Kim (Southampton) with 579. Kit-Lun Tong (UEA) scored 567 and there was also a 574 for Charlotte Hempsall (ARU).

Surrey end the season as senior SEAL champions for the fourth time, but for the first time in 14 years. Their previous wins came in 2004, 2008 and 2009. They ended on 69 points, with defending champions UEA and Southampton both on 66. UEA took second place on aggregate with Southampton third. Remarkably Southampton actually won 3 out of the 5 legs, but finishing 8th in leg 2 effectively scuppered their chances of silverware. Imperial completed the leading group of 4 teams on 63.

Best of the rest were Anglia Ruskin who were 5th on 52 points and the last team to average over 2000. ARU were absent from SEAL last season, post Covid, but returned to post their best ever finish in the senior SEAL table, comfortably beating 8th in 2018. Brunel were 6th on 49 points - their joint best result for 16 years.

In the novice table, East Anglia had a massive 10 point lead going into match 5 as they prepared to win the SEAL novice title for the first time, having won the senior title for the first time last season. All they really needed to do was turn up, which they did, but with an incomplete novice team of 2 archers. It would have been by far the biggest league point lead thrown away on the final day ever, but fortunately for UEA they were not punished too severely. They finished 8th in the match which was enough to see them home regardless. Additionally, nearest rivals Imperial were only 4th. Surrey won the match with 1424, a mere 2 points ahead of Brunel. UEA's novices landed on 67 points, with Imperial on 61, Brunel on 60.

The updated SEAL tables can be seen on the SEAL 2022/23 page.

Sheffield win the BUCS Qualifying extracted leg for NEUAL, scoring 2261, storming nearly 100 clear of the field. Lancaster took second on 2166, with Durham (2144), Leeds (2130) and York (2121) all close behind. UCLan were sixth, six points under the 2100 barrier. These results see Leeds stay top, now on 56 points, but their lead has been reduced from 5 to 3 points. Sheffield have jumped up to second on 53, with York a further three points back on 50, leading the chasing pack. In the equivalent novice match, Newcastle and Leeds were first and second and again were close - they remain the top two in the league table. Huddersfield finished top in the unsighted match, with Sheffield second and as a result, Huddersfield now lead Sheffield by a point overall.

The updated NEUAL tables can be seen on the NEUAL 2022/23 page.