Guildford Table Tennis News February 2024

Published on: 20 Feb, 2024
Updated on: 19 Feb, 2024

By Steve Day

League Round-Up

Starting with Division Four. Woking D continue to romp away with this division and as at the end of January have an 18-point lead, with a game in hand.

Aftermath C are second having overtaken Merrow J by one point.

At the other end of the table Woking C have climbed to fifth position, leaving Abinger B in last place.

Godalming G may be second to bottom of the table but their match against the division leaders was a marathon affair with 18 of the 35 sets played going to deuce or 11-9.

Woking’s Slavko Ivanovic, in particular, had a tough evening losing two out of his three matches and one of those 19-17 in the fourth.

The overall match score was 5-4 to Woking. Andy Smart and Sumit Kumar remain unbeaten and so are joint leaders of the averages.

In the Premier Division Burymead B have built a formidable 20-point lead over their second placed club rivals, Burymead A.

Merrow A are a further one point behind. Both second and third placed sides have a game in hand of the leaders.

Godalming B remain firmly entrenched at the bottom 18 points behind the nearest team, College Hill A.

Arguably the performance of the month goes to Merrow C who beat last year’s champions, Merrow A, 5-4.

The A team were without regular Martin Townshend, but nevertheless the C team deserved their victory.

Match of the evening was Youngkwan Moon’s win over A team stalwart John Robinson, 13-11 in the fifth!

Burymead’s Ross Saxby returned to the top of the averages closely followed by Godalming’s Adam Laws.

In joint third place are two more Burymead players, Daniel Heo and Phil Snelson.

Godalming C increased their lead at the top of Division One to seven points over Challoner A who by their standards had a poor month.

In their final match of the month they lost 4-5 to joint third placed Abinger A.

Chris Pullinger.

Chris Pullinger did the damage with wins over all three of the Challoner players.

The other team in joint third place is Ash, who also had a mixed month with two wins and two losses.

Bottom of the table is Bramley A who are three points behind Aftermath A. The latter team has a game in hand.

Kinga Oryl of Godalming C now heads the averages with an impressive 89.66% followed by Ash’s Ben Fereday on 79.17% and Abinger’s Chris Pullinger on 75%.

Two other players have 80% or more but have participated in less than half the games played.

The top of the table for Division Two remains much the same with College Hill C leading the way.

They have a 14-point advantage over Aftermath B and solidified their position in a closely fought match between the two teams in early January.

The result was still in the balance up until the last set of the last game between College Hill’s Paul Tanton and Aftermath’s Dave Wilson.

Paul took revenge for a defeat by Dave earlier in the season by winning the last set 11-6 which gave overall victory to College Hill 5-4.

Dianne McLellan

Dianne McLellan won two games for Aftermath.

Woking A are in third place but are another nine points back. Only a miracle can save Bramley B from last place as Godalming E have now accumulated 44 points versus Bramley’s mere 29.

After an excellent month where he won eight out of eight games played, Paul Tanton has joined Christopher Copps at the top of the averages. Both have 87.5%

In Division Three, College Hill D have strengthened their lead at the top and are now 10 points ahead of Godalming F, with a game in hand.

Four points further back are Merrow G, however, they have three games in hand over Godalming F and two over the leaders.

Watch this space, all is still to play for at the top!

At the other end, Challoner B are still rooted to the bottom of the table with a mere 18 points from 10 matches.

Despite losing his first two matches of the season during January, Caden Wilson remains top of the averages with 92.59%. He is closely followed by clubmate James Clement on 87.88% with Merrow G’s Anil Gadage third on 76.19%.

Surrey County Vets First Team

Guildford League players, Phil Snelson, Kinga Oryl, Adam Laws and Daniel Heo were selected to play for the Surrey Vets First Team at the recent County Championships meeting and won both their matches against Cambridgeshire and Bedfordshire, convincingly.

Surrey Veterans first team.

A quick reminder that the 2024 Guildford TTA Closed Tournament will be held on April 20 and 21 at Christ’s College, Guildford.

The closing for entries is April 15. Entry forms are available on the GTTA website: https://guildford.ttleagues.com/article/guildfordclosed2024

Guildford National Junior League Report by Adam Laws

Guildford’s three National Junior League teams were in action on January 21 in Horsham.

Guildford A team.

Guildford A were represented by Anay Gandhi, Shane Karunakaran and Seamus Walker.

Guildford B team.

Guildford B were represented by Alexis Solomonides, Oscar Snelling and Chen Liang.

Guildford C team.

Guildford C were represented by Curran Culkarni, Daria Rudovskaia and Evan Faulkner.

Guildford A and Guildford B participated in division 1 and Guildford C in division 2.

Guildford A finished secondin the table – finishing level on points with winners Sparta B.

In the match between the two teams, Guildford A lost 4-2. Anay Gandhi and Shane Karunakaran won one each against Aimee Man and Alexei Kuzbin respectively.

Guildford A also won three matches against Horsham A, Guildford B and Sparta A.

Guildford B finished bottom on six points and get relegated back into Division 2 after being promoted from there in November.

Oscar Snelling did the best with five wins out of 10.

Guildford C finished second in Division 2 behind winners South Croydon B who didn’t drop a single point.

Curran and Evan won four matches out of eight and Daria won three matches out of eight.

Website of the Guildford Table Tennis League.