News Archive - Oct 2011

Jack Hammer

The first weekend of the Junior British League ran last weekend at the Tipton Sports Academy in the West Midlands and a number of Sussex teams competed. Jack Bennett was the Sussex star of the show winning all 10 of his matches.

In the Boys Division 2A the Sussex Alliance team lies in second after their efforts. Pocket battleship Jack Bennett swept all before him but younger brother Josh and Finny Wilson also made valuable contributions of 4/10 as they gained four team wins to lie on equal points to leaders Irish Boys. Their only loss was a surprising one, 4-2 to lower lying Batts 2.

The Alliance's girls team also performed well to win 2/5 team matches and place themselves in mid table. Brighton girl Emma Sheen played excellently to win six but was well supported by Kate Cheer with five and L. Evans with two.

In the lower boys divisions - 3B and 4A - Horsham TTC had two teams in the mix and found it tough. The club's first team (Dan Pound, Tom Windrum, Adam Corell) had a tough time, winning only one to leave itself second from bottom but its second team (Ryan Williams, Eric Van Mol, Matt Van Yperen) fared slightly better winning two team matches but still lying in the relegation zone, second from bottom, come the close of play. Tom Windrum with 40% was Horsham I top man and Ryan Williams with 60% was the Horsham II star.

Further information about the Horsham teams available by clicking here

Junior British League website is available by clicking here

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Ping Pong POP Take 3

POP Brighton is hosting round 3 of "Ping Pong POP" on Thursday 20th October from 7pm. Brighton's first ping-pong social club is a place to hang out with your old friends, meet new friends and play ping-pong while sipping a cocktail, eating some gourmet food, or perhaps watching a high level ping-pong match played by quality players recruited by the organisers.

Venue is The Royal York Hotel, 41-45 Old Steine, Brighton, East Sussex, BN1 1NP. Entry is free, there will be three tables available for play and cold bottles of Asahi will be on sale at just £2!

The evening will be a mixture of of hard bat competition, doubles matches, coaching, interactive non-competitive games, exhibitions and bouts of extreme ping played on grand pianos! All standards of ping pong player welcome. Dress code is casual. No tight shorts please! See you tomorrow!

Check out video of the first Ping Pong POP night

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Pingers Picks Up the Pace

Horsham District Council's Silver Pingers project for taking table tennis into residential care homes is now getting into full swing with four homes receiving coaching input on a monthly basis.

A number of residents, some aged into their nineties, at Valerie Manor (Upper Beeding), Upper Mead (Henfield), the Henfield Day Care Centre and Glen Arun (Horsham) have responded with great enthusiasm to the opportunity.

Sessions have so far included aspects such as individual ball control skills, pairs rallying, the robot challenge, hitting the ball at a range of batskills targets (archery target, basketball hoop etc) and a few players have even progressed to matchplay.

Office Manager at Valerie Manor, Alan Fry, described their first session as a 'roaring success' and said 'it was nice to see so many residents taking part...and staff!'

Tables, bats, balls and nets have been left on free loan at three of the homes so keener residents can play when they feel like it in between receiving the coached sessions.

Chichester University's sports science department has agreed to do a formal evaluation of the impact and benefits of the programme in the coming months.

More Horsham District homes are invited to take up this free opportunity by contacting Paul Taylor on 01403-215637 or paul.taylor@horsham.gov.uk

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Circuit Re-Wired at K2

The Sussex Circuit kicked off again after an absence of 18 months with an event at K2, Crawley on Saturday 15^th October with a new generation of intermediate /beginner players which was attended by 38 players.

The players were split into three ability bands in morning and afternoon events with the objective of the players playing as many matches as possible against similar standard opposition.

The morning event had an entry of 16 players in Band C and all players played seven or eight matches over a four hour period. William Goodstone from Eastbourne came out clear victor winning all his matches in straight sets for gold and Tom Brooke from Horsham in second place with just the one loss against William.

The A and B standard players had a relatively low entry in the morning so it was decided that the bands would be merged together with 5 players playing each other twice so every player played 8 matches. This brought out some surprising results with Holly Holder, Kate Cheer and Bart Rayson all beating A band standard player Matt Van Yperen in their first group of matches.

Holly Holder also had a really good straight sets victory over England U-11 international Kate Cheer. Bart Rayson had a narrow five sets victory over Holly Holder. Kate Cheer then beat Bart Rayson to leave Holly, Kate and Bart all on two victories each after the first round of matches. Clear leader was Mark Collins who was undefeated.

Then came the second round of matches where Matt made up for his disappointing first round and beat Kate , Holly and Bart. Kate took revenge for her earlier defeat by Holly to beat her 11-9 in the fifth and Bart continued his good performances with victories over Kate and Holly. Mark Collins remained undefeated to take gold in the A band. Bart Rayson took A band silver with four victories and Matt came out victor over Kate on points count back with both on three victories each.

Morning finishing positions:

The afternoon session had a considerably stronger A band with the addition of England schools international Josh Bennett, Michael Bridger and three improving players from Brighton; David Pringuer, George Tester and Paul Burgin.

Victory went to Mark Collins after a superb five set victory over Josh Bennett which meant that he was undefeated on the day with 14 victories.

There were five band B players and they all played each other twice to give them eight matches each and again Bart Rayson demonstrated his quality coming out overall winner with six victories. Also with six victories but losing on count back was James Arnold who has recently taken the decision to change his bat to conventional reverse rubbers.

The C band had nine players competing and the gold medal went to Sam Wray who won all his matches and second went to Alex Bryant who had just the one loss in a close fought match against Sam.

Afternoon finishing positions:

A big thanks to all the helpers, that assisted on the day and to all the players that made this a great event. The next circuit tournament will be on the 7^th January 2012 at K2 , Crawley and will run in parallel with an ETTA credited 1 star competition which will be suitable for A and B standard players.

Steve Pound

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Griffin Security and Technology Ltd

Griffin Security and Technology Ltd is a key sponsor of the competition build up in Sussex and Director Charlotte Bain is featured in the first embedded video on the Alliance site being interviewed to explain why her company was keen to invest into Sussex table tennis.

Click here to visit the video page

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Tyler Takes It

Tyler Paul won a superbly contested table tennis competition at the Sussex Reaching Higher Games run for young people with disabilities today at Christ's Hospital School near Horsham. The Games were organised as a collaboration between Horsham District Council and Christ's Hospital School and Horsham Table Tennis Club supported the table tennis event.

A total of nine competitors entered the event and right from the off, as they contested two first round groups, the standard of play was high and there were some great matches.

England team wheelchair player, Tyler Paul, justified his favourite tag by topping his initial group but he did not have it all his own way. Paul Nash from Burgess Hill also qualified for the final top group in style.

Paul and Nash were joined by Horsham Table Tennis Club representatives Cameron Parfitt and Stuart Cutler in the final group shoot out which provided some fantastic encounters. Cutler gave a great account of himself but was just nudged out into third leaving Paul and Nash to contest the key match.

Nash showed that he's made great improvement in the last 18 months to push Paul all the way but Paul's experience just managed to see him through to allow him to add another gold medal to his growing collection of silverware. Well done also to Andrew Prizeman who topped the consolation group.

Event organiser and Horsham TTC Head Coach, Martin Jezisek, was delighted with the success of the competition. 'We only gave out two medals today but in truth every player deserved one. All the players rose to the competitive challenge. Some of these players could go on to great things if they train hard and believe in themselves."

Thanks go to Christ's Hospital students who umpired all the matches in disciplined style.