The Abingdonian 2019

80 The Abingdonian Crescent House One of the highlights of the year for any Housemaster is the annual House Singing Competition, held in the last week of the first half of Michaelmas Term. Although the preparations can sometimes be stressful, and there is always a worry as to whether it will all come together in time, it is also one of the few times that the whole house, all 102 boys, day and boarding, stand and compete together. House spirit is always on display at these occasions, and it was no exception this year. Benjamin Adams ably conducted an enthusiastic and joyful rendition of Mr Blue Sky, by Electric Light Orchestra, for which Crescent House were jubilant at being awarded... third place! It is easy to snigger, but this ended a decade-long absence from the podium for Crescent, and more importantly, really brought the house together in a way that was a pleasure to see. I thank all the boys for their contributions to the event this year, and every year. It has been a successful year in sports for various Crescent boys, and it is always great to see so many excellent individual and team performances. There were some significant achievements in the various inter-house competitions throughout the year. In the Michaelmas Term, Crescent students had great success in the badminton, with Perry Tsai and Brian Ho winning the U18 doubles competition and Tong Tong Sukamongkol performing well in the singles, meaning the U18 team came second. Able contributions from James Deng, Benjamin Wallis-Smith and Conrad Chung meant that the Crescent badminton team finished third overall. The U18 rugby team of Ed Hayes, Alisdair Cornforth, Oliver Botting, Louis Heard, Joshua Jackson, Nathan Hudson, Kai Miles, Andrew Russell and Ethan Webb put in an excellent set of performances and, although they weren’t quite able to win the competition, they finished a strong second. In the pool competition, Dan Keeble finished second in the U15 event, while Owen Ravden finished fourth, giving Crescent House second place overall in the competition. The highlight of the Lent Term inter- house sports was an excellent first place in the U18 hockey competition, with outstanding performances from a team consisting of Rory Mitchell, Kipp Mainstone, Louis Heard, Will Stacey, Harry Capon, Nathan Hudson and Brian Ho. With all of those boys being either fifth year or Lower Sixth, they are well-placed to continue their success next year. The fifth year Crescent team also put in a fantastic and consistent performance in the Road Relay at the end of March. A team of Freddie Cunningham, Kipp Mainstone, Rory Mitchell and Hugo Wade completed the course in 36 minutes and 9 seconds, and were the overall winners of the event. The Summer Term brought the inter- house athletics, and various Crescent boys demonstrated their prowess. Chigozie Oge-Evans won the U14 shot A event, while Harry Nye won the U14 400m B event and Jonathan Cai the U15 javelin B event. In the inter- house sports, Joshuah Ebner and Isaac Tan won the U15 tennis doubles competition, while Archie and Harry Notley came second in the croquet. There were many Crescent boys representing the school in a wide variety of sports, with too many fantastic achievements to include here. Some stand-outs though include Kai Miles and Scott Yap’s continuing success in the swimming pool, as part of the swimming team that finished sixth in the Otter Medley Cup and seventh in the Bath Freestyle Cup. Both of these are national finals with over 80 schools competing across the UK and these are the best finishing positions the school