Guildford Table Tennis News May 2024

Published on: 14 May, 2024
Updated on: 13 May, 2024

By Steve Day

Welcome to the ninth and as usual the final edition of our report of the season.

This report includes a complete roll of honour for the season and also a report on the Closed Championships, courtesy of Adam Laws, together with a special team feature.

The presentation evening at Merrow Village Hall is on Friday June 14, starting at 7.30pm.

The annual meeting will be held on Monday, June 17.

Final league round up

Burymead A made it a ‘one two’ for the club by finishing runners up in the Premier Division and College Hill B succumbed to the pressure by finishing in the second relegation place in Division One, losing out by just one point.

Knockout Cup update

The winners of our cup competitions are as follows:

Competition winners and runners up:

Percy Lawes (Premier Div): Burymead, Godalming A.

Intermediate (Div 1: Godalming C, Ash.

Lewis Cup (Div 2): Merrow E, Godalming D.

The Last Two (Div 3): Merrow G, Godalming F.

Bob Hammond (Div 4): Aftermath C, Merrow H.

Vets: Burymead, Godalming

Handicap: Godalming G, Merrow F.

As might be expected the results of the divisional competitions largely went with league form.

The Handicap final is, of course, a different story. This season, Merrow F from Division Three took on Godalming G from Division Four.

The teams were:
Godalming: Richard Bones, Kayla Wong and Ashley Wong.

Merrow: Stephen Schofield, Keith Brown, Ross Matthew.

Well done to Godalming as they came through to win 9-3!

Guildford Closed Table Tennis Championships 2024
Report by Adam Laws

Adam Laws.

Adam Laws and Ross Saxby.

Open Singles: Adam Laws (Godalming) defeated Ross Saxby (Burymead) 11-7 in the deciding set to win the open singles title.

Adam defeated Jake Buckley (College Hill) in the quarter finals and Shaun Robertson (Merrow) in the semi-finals.

Ross defeated Kinga Oryl (Godalming) in the quarter finals and then in the semi-finals he defeated Graham Faulkner (Merrow), who scored an excellent win against team mate Max Flint (Merrow) a round earlier 11-8 in the decider.

Group 5 was the most dramatic of the open singles groups: Shaun Robertson, Dave Woodacre (College Hill) and Kinga Oryl were locked on three wins each in a five-player group.

However, after countback it was Shaun and Kinga who went through; Dave had to settle for a place in the consolation event, which he ultimately won 3-0 against Charlie Alvarez (Godalming).

Open Doubles: Ross Saxby paired up with Shaun Robertson to take the open doubles title by defeating top seeds Adam Laws and Max Flint.

Ross and Shaun had earlier scraped past Graham Faulkner and John Robinson (Merrow) 13-11 in the decider in a titanic battle.

Ladies / Mixed Events:

Godalming’s Kinga Oryl took a clean sweep of Sunday’s events.

She won the ladies singles in a group of four with Daria Rudovskaia finishing second.

Kinga Oryl and Adam Laws.

Kinga then won the mixed doubles with Adam Laws against Jake Buckley (College Hill) and Shula Laws (Godalming) and then partnered Elly Cheuk to win the ladies doubles in a group of three with Shula and Daria finishing second.

Junior events:

Under 19s: Harry Barker (Godalming) was the strongest competitor in the Under 19 events and took a clean sweep.

He beat Seamus Walker in the singles final 3-0; Oscar Snelling and Curran Kulkarni (both Godalming) were the defeated semi-finalists. He then teamed up with Daria Rudovskaia in the doubles to defeat Chen Liang (Godalming) and Oscar Snelling 3-0.

Under 15s: Seamus Walker defeated Rex Morgan 3-1 in a closely fought under 15 singles final.

Curran Kulkarni and Alexis Solomonides (Godalming) were the defeated semi-finalists.

The doubles title was taken by brothers Evan and Nathan Faulkner (Merrow) 3-0 in the final match of the whole tournament against number one seeds Curran and Seamus.

Under 13s: Evan Faulkner won 3-1 against Kayla Wong (Godalming). Elly Cheuk and Hersley Liu were the defeated semi-finalists. Owen Cook won the consolation against Merrow team mate Gabriel Chan.

Kinga Oryl and Elly Cheuk.

Under 11s: Elly Cheuk added the Guildford Under 11 title to her Surrey Under 11 girls title. She defeated Lucas Owen who defeated his brother Cian Owen in the semi-final. Harley Wong was the other semi-finalist. Dexter Hope took the under 11 consolation.

Over 40 events:
Veterans: Steve Davis (Merrow) played outstandingly to win the Over 40 singles. After successive wins over Chris Pullinger (Abinger) and Kinga Oryl, he defeated Jason Tendler (Merrow) in the final.

Kinga scored a brilliant 3-0 win over top seed John Robinson in the quarter finals. John managed to get his revenge over Kinga in the Over 40 doubles event: he partnered Jason Tendler to defeat Kinga and her partner Mike Slifkin (Godalming). Diane McLellan won the Over 40 consolation event against Brendan Bayley (Abinger).

Steve Davis and John Robinson.

Masters: John Robinson won a closely contested battle in the deciding end against Steve Davis – the last event to finish.

Divisional events:
Premier: Daniel Heo (Burymead) defeated Jason Tendler in the singles. Mike Slifkin and Steve Davis were the defeated semi-finalists. Jason Tendler and John Robinson won their second doubles event of the day with a win over Micky Lang (Merrow) and Mike Slifkin.

First and Second divisions: There were 10 entrants in the Division 1 singles event. Kinga Oryl defeated Chris Pullinger in the first division singles final. Jonathan Chernett (Godalming) and James Wyncoll (Ash) were the defeated semi-finalists.

Diane McLellan (Aftermath) beat Peter Palmer (Bramley) in the division 2 singles event.

Chris Pullinger and Brendan Bayley.

In a nail-biting final, Chris Pullinger and Brendan Bayley of Abinger won deuce in the decider against Harry Barker (Godalming) and Yevgeni Bohrieiev (Bramley).

Third and Fourth division: Chen Liang produced his best table tennis to win the division 3 title against players with much higher Guildford League averages.

He needed five games to get past Merrow’s Anil Gadage. Robert Warren (Merrow) won on countback in a three-way tie with Alexis Solomonides and Curran Kulkarni (Godalming).

He defated Alexis 3-0 but lost to Curran 3-2 who himself lost 3-0 to Alexis.

His sets ratio of 5-3 was superior to the other two players.

Robert partnered Merrow team mate Ryan Troop to score a brilliant upset deciding set win over Godalming’s Division 3 pair Oscar Snelling and Chen Liang in the division 3 and 4 doubles event.

That’s it for this season! Congratulations to all those who took part. As with last season, thanks for your support throughout.

The circulation of the association’s newsletter continues to grow through various media channels, including Facebook, The Guildford Dragon NEWS and, of course, direct mailing.

As with last year big thanks should also go to Mike Loveder and Mike Rhodes, both of whom allow us to use their photos.

Have a great summer and keep practising!

Website of the Guildford Table Tennis League.