Just found a new table tennis coaching web site. It mainly consists of a number of short high quality videos on basic strokes. Worth a look – http://www.tabletenniscoach.com/main.html. Sponsored by the Northumberland Table Tennis Association.

“This site provides excellent video tutorials ranging from basic to advanced skills. ETTA coach Bernie Morris talks you though the different techniques, with demonstration from the Barella brothers (Anthony and Graeme), and David Graham”.

The last post here was about our defeat in the first round of the Halifax Table Tennis League handicap tournament. Coincidently, a week too late, a new post on Greg Lett’s table tennis web site offers some good advice and tips on how to play doubles. There is a possibility that a consolation tournament will be run for 1st round losers so this might still prove useful for us. However, I don’t relish being knocked out in the first round of a consolation event. Perhaps there will be a consolation consolation event too! Greg’s artcle is at: http://tabletennis.about.com/od/matchplayadvice/a/doublestips.htm?nl=1

POPPs was well and truly beaten by Lions last night losing 8 – 1. The combined age and experience or our team (Derek, Terry and Peter), about 186 years between us, was not enough to overcome the youthful exuberance, speed and rather disconcerting flexibility of the Lions – Chie, Ben and Hannah – all who appear to be in their teens. It would have helped if our combined experience had included a bit more table tennis of course and if the youngsters had shown a bit more respect for their elders! It started well with Derek beating Chie, playing at number one, 3 games to 2. However, that turned out to be the only set we won. We could have taken a couple of more sets possibly, with Terry losing in 5 games to Ben and Derek losing in 5 games to Hannah. But we didn’t. We were all very pleased for Hannah who was delighted after winning her first set against Peter as this was the first she had won this year, possibly ever. She continued to fill her boots by beating the rest of the POPPs team too! I only hope in the years to come when she looks back on a glittering table tennis career she’ll think fondly of the kindly old gents that gave her her first big break and confidence boost. One of the most interesting aspects of the match was playing against Chie who uses the pen holder grip favoured by many Chinese players and demonstrated to great effect in the Bejing Olympics last September. Chie’s game was based mainly on blocking against top spin, taking the ball just after the bounce and directing it back accurately to all parts of the table, and sharp pushes against back spin. These were essentially back hand shots and reminded me very much of our Mieszek’s style of play. It would have been fascinating to see them play one another. Once again it was evident that our opponents had better defensive games than us and played more consistently. All three of us had our moments with a sprinkling of good attacking winners but not enough to counteract the unforced errors, unreturned services, serves of the end of the table and so on.

Division 3 results for week commencing 10th November 2008. Full leagues results can be found in the Results section.

• Northowram (B Gee 3, J Wasilewski  1, R Gee 0)  4   v  Sowerby 3 (a Whiteley 2, J Korner 1, P Parry 2) 5
• HxTTC Evergreens (M Curry 3, D Lewis 3, M Higgins 3)  9  v  HxTTC Popp (J Taylor 0, R Thomas 0, M Konrad 0)  0
• HxTTC Lions (B Speak 1, H Kendall 0, J Tallis 1)  2   v  HxTTC  A.R.K (K Broadbent 2, A Feetham 3, R Oldroyd 2)  7
• Old Town Hounds (S Allen 1, P Ward 3, R Tipton 1)  5   v   HxTTC Tradesmen 2 (M Knapton 0, H Witherspoon 2, R Holmes 2)  4

We don’t have the new League averages yet but it is likely that POPPs have dropped down from the dizzy heights of 6th. However, there’s a longway to go yet.

Taking place at the Halifax TT Centre, with Evergreens hosting, expectations were realistic in the POPPS camp, in view of the strong reputation of their opponents. In the opening set, John Taylor had the best result by winning his third game 11-4, but having struggled to find his form in the first two games, losing 11-5 and 11-4, he needed to keep control in game 4. Whilst even at first, Michael Curry edged ahead to win 11-5.Overall, Curry won 3-1.

Robin Thomas struggled against David Lewis, going down 11-4, 11-1 and 11-5, being inconsistent and impulsive, with only a small proportion of shots working. Mieszek Konrad fared slightly better against Michael Higgins, with some dogged back hand defence, but eventually went down 11-6, 11-3 and 11-4.

A pattern was beginning to emerge, although Taylor worked hard against Lewis, with a close first game ending with a narrow 12-10 victory to Lewis. The second game seemed even at first, but Lewis moved ahead to win 11-6, with a similar pattern in the third game ending 11-7 to Lewis. One had the impression that in skill terms, Taylor had the measure of his opponent, but inconsistent attacking shots impeded his progress.

Match 5 was held up while Konrad patched up a bleeding finger, but the result was not affected, and Curry won 11-4, 11-1 and 11-3, in spite of some athletic defensive work. Thomas against Higgins went the same way, each game being won to 4 (at least some consistency creeping in!). Similarly, Konrad succumbed to Lewis, 11-3, 11-4, 11-5.

Could Taylor recover some pride against Higgins? Well, it was close to start, and at one time it was 8 each, but in the final stages Higgins moved ahead to win 11-8. In the second, Higgins won 11-6 and rounded up the win with 11-7, despite some good smashes from Taylor. The final set, between Thomas and Curry, ended predictably at 11-4, 11-7 and 11-4, with some attacking shots, almost in desperation, salvaging some points.

Overall, POPPS failed to win one set, and only took one game. The message seems to be experience, consistency and match strategy. There is no substitute for sheer time spent practising and in the league and this POPPS team certainly learned from the experience. Our strongest teams can win against the right sort of opposition, but Evergreens may prove to be one of the better teams in this year’s League 3.

Results for week commencing Monday 3rd November. Full results an be seen in the Result page.

• HxTTC A.R.K. (K Broadbent 1, A Feetham 1, R Oldroyd 0)  2   v  HxTTC Evergreens (M Curry 3, D Lewis 3, B Hanson 1)   7
• Old Town Hoods (J Sweeney 0, C Scott 0, P Dean 0)   0   v  HxTTC Rams 2 (S Northey 3, D Stott 3, J Broadbent 3)  9
• Sowerby 3 (A Whiteley 2, J Korner 1, P Parry 2)  5   v  HxTTC Lions (C Hick 2, B Speak 0, J Tallis 2)  4
• HxTTC POPP (J Taylor 3, T Wassall 1, D Greenwood 2)  6   v  Old Town Robins (S Rothwell 2, F Rothwell 1, S  Allen 0)  3

Missing HxTTC Tradesmen 2 v Northowram

After our first 4 matches we are now 6th in the division, exactly halfway, for the moment but several teams have matches in hand over us so this state of affairs may not last long! Especially as we are playing the Evergreens next Monday.

What a lovely bunch Halifax Table Tennis League Division 3 players are! We played Old Town Robins on Monday and once again the match was played in an excellent spirit. This is not to say that we are not competitive -  there was plenty of huffing and puffing and tutting when errors were made or edges of the table and net cords where brought into play - but as usual everyone was very supportive and friendly. I discovered for instance that the father and son combo, Fred and Simon Rothwell, had been to the World Series cycling track racing event at the Manchester Velodrome over the weekend and saw the GB team do brilliantly as usual. In fact our women won every one of the 8 women’s events and thus 8 gold medals. I tried to get tickets for this event but it was sold out months ago, no doubt because of the GB cycling team’s spectacular results at the Bejing Olympics this summer. I’m very keen on  cycle track racing as I used to race in the Herne Hill and Paddington track leagues for Tooting Bicycle Club in the  60s and 70s. It turns out that Fred rides in cycle speedway events still and we both rode on the same track at Tolworth in the early 60s but not at the same time.

Any way, we won the match 6 sets to 3. John played at no. 1 and won all 3, Terry played at no. 2 and won 1, and Derek played at no. 3 and won 2. It was a closer game than the final score shows as 5 of the sets went to 5 games of which we won 3 and the Robins won 2.  This is the second match we have won, out of the 4 we have played so far. Not bad. But no doubt we have even sterner tests to come. There are 11 teams in the division and our ambitions are beginning to take shape. It would be nice to finish somewhere in the middle of the division and, so far at least, this looks a possibility. Next week we play the Evergreens. It may not be the same players but this could be the team that played in Division 2 last year. It looks lke they have won all their matches this season so far convincingly. Should be quite a challenge for our next intrepid three.

Looks like we haven’t been sent the results for week 3. This might be because we had a bye and they are only sent to teams that played. We will check on this and fill the gap if we can. Division 3 results for week 4 commencing 27th October are as follows:

• Old Town Robins (S Rothwell 2, C Scott 0, F Rothwell 0)  2  v  HxTTC Tradesmen 2 (H Witherspoon 2, R Holmes 3, B Whitehead 2)  7
• HxTTC A.R.K. (K Broadbent 1, A Feetham 1, R Oldroyd 2)  4  v  HxTTC  Rams 2 (S Northey 3, J Broadbent 1, R Veal 1)  5
• HxTTC Popp (D Greenwood 3, T Wassall 1, M Konrad 1)  5  v  Old Town Hoods (D Coneron 2, C Scott 0, D Williamson 2)  4
• HxTTC Tradesmen 2 (H Witherspoon 0, R Holmes 1, B Whitehead 0)  1  v HxTTC Evergreens (M Curry 3, M Higgins 3, B Hanson 2)  8
• Sowerby 3 (A Whiteley 3, J Korner 3, L Whiteley 0)  6  v  Old Town Robins (D Coneron 1, F Rothwell 1, S Rothwell 1)  3

At the end of week 4, after playing 3 matches, our league position is 9th out out 11. Realistically we will be doing very well to finish near the top of the bottom half. This means 7th at best. Full results for this week can be found on the Results page.