Lindemann and Christiani star players

WITTEN - The big winner of the first double weekend in the German league is BCC Witten. The reigning German champion won its two matches, against Neustadt and Magdeburg, both 8-0. The team with Eddy Leppens as frontman leads the ranking with the maximum score.

Also GT Buer and Bergisch Gladbach started the competition with two victories. The highly estimated Ravensburg started with a win over Velbert, but lost its next match against Bergisch.

The only big surprise on the first day was Stekrades win over Bottrop. The team that was threatened for relegation last year, now started with a 6-2 victory. Christian Rudolph won the only winner for Bottrop: he beat Jean van Erp in 29 innings.
Roger Liere, Ramazan Durdu and Carsten Rapsel took the win for Sterkrade.

BCC Witten had a flawless start off, first on Saturday against CBV Neustadt with 1.429 team average. Best man was Ronny Lindemann, who bested Thomas Ahrens 40-30 in 20 innings.

Eddy Leppens (28 innings), Stefan Galla (25) and Volker Baten (39) signed for the 8-0 final score.
On Sunday also BC Magdeburg was swept from the tables with an 8-0 score. The weakened Sachsen-Anhalter team could not put up a great fight. Only Markus Schönhoff was a tough opponent for Stefan Galla: 40-39 in 38 innings.

Ronny Lindemann showed again his high class in the  Sunday match. He defeated Mario Jordan in 23 innings and recorded 1.860 average over two matches, the best of all players so far. Bergisch Gladbach, led by Martin Horn traveled to southern Germany. At the end of the weekend the team had two victories in the luggage with only one lost match. Martin Horn won on Saturday with a one carom difference against Michael Puse (29 innings).

Andreas Horvath couldn’t match at all with Dave Christiani, who won 40-16 in 30. Markus Dömer defeated Joachim Bohrer 40-33 in 33.

On Sunday, Bergisch defeated one of the competitors for the title. Best man was Dave Christiani with a 40-16 victory over Klaus Bosel in only 19 innings. Martin Horn won the clash against Murat Naci Coklu in 31 innings.

GT Buer first defeated Magdeburg on Saturday (6-2). Dion Nelin was the only winnter in the Magdeburg team beating Jens Eggers 40-16 in 29 innings. On Sunday, GT Buer continued with a 8-0 win over Neustadt with Markus Galla as best man (in 25 innings).

In two weeks the next double weekend is on the calendar.

The results:

Saturday:
Witten-Neustadt 8-0, Bottrop-Sterkrade 2-6, Munich-Bergisch Gladbach 2-6, Ravensburg-Velbert 6-2, GT Buer-Magdeburg 6-2.

Sunday:
Witten-Magdeburg 8-0, Munich-Velbert 6-2, Ravensburg- Bergisch Gladbach 2-6, GT Buer-Neustadt 8-0.