REVENGE IS A DISH BEST SERVED COLD.

When you watch any of the Final Destination movies, you kind of have a pretty good idea what’s going to happen. Everyone is going to get it. And it’s going to pretty graphic. It’s a given. Matches between Irving and Karmarama have always been the same. Karmarama always lose. Always.
Tuesday, October the 13th saw a dramatic script change.
It was like watching Final Destination 7 expecting to see a slaughter fest and ten minutes in it turns into a Rom com.
Jim ‘Geordie rage’ Brumby, Sam ‘The Machine’ Breen and Dave ‘The Truth’ Buonaguidi ventured to the furthest reaches of the league, New Cross. A land far, far away, of burnt out off-licences and random stabbings, the streets littered with used syringes and artificial legs. These Three Amigo’s sought to overturn sports most one sided historical grudge match. They were pitched against 2 familiar faces and one newbie. Gary Grimshaw and Rona Radenhurst have been the equivalent of human kryptonite to Karmarama over the years and had that kind of swagger that 5 years of non stop victory affords you as they greeted Olympia’s finest and only ping pong team. They were joined by the strangely named Chinese lad, Train.
Yes. Train.
The venue was the newly refurbished sports hall of the All Saints Church and it became the scene of one of the greatest ever exorcisms in history. Even better than the one in the film of the same name.
Karmarama were unstoppable. Geordie Rage properly dismantled Grimshaw. Then The Machine pulled the wings of the fly that was Radenhurst. Next the moment of Truth. Buonaguidi has never fared well against Irving, in fact his record against them is comical. But following his team-mates inspired showing he met Train in a head on collision of ping pong fury. Train came off the tracks, and burst into flames.
Suddenly Karmarama found themselves 3-0 up and Irving were looking like pensioners on a cruise ship in the middle of a hurricane Katrina. Green faces and shitty pants all round.
And it just got worse. Geordie Rage rediscovering the form that made him the Battle Hill Ping Pong champ in 1982 won all three matches with aplomb. Then The Truth won all his three, beating Grimshaw and Radenhurst for the first time in his pathetic little life. Finally, The Machine, who was only in his second competitive match showed skill, judgement, poise, panache and other stuff to sew up a simply majestic victory of epic proportions, and win all his games too. The doubles of Truth and Rage against Grimshaw and Radenhurst won through the make it a clean sweep.
Ten nil.
A victory that will resonate for many years to come.