Twenty seven members and guests of the New Milton Table Tennis Club attended the Annual Presentation Evening of the Bournemouth and District Table Tennis Association at the Ocean View Hotel in Bournemouth, and witnessed a number of club players receive their trophies from special guest Alex Perry. Alex is a former England No 1 player with an impressive list of top level titles. He has England National titles in Singles, Men’s Doubles 4 times and Mixed Doubles 7 times. A gold medal at the Commonwealth Games with the England Men’s team and Gold Medals at the Commonwealth Table Tennis Championships are just some of the honours achieved at international level.

After an excellent meal, Alex Perry gave a truly inspirational speech and then proceeded to present the trophies under the watchful eye of Association General Secretary Gordon White. First up for the New Milton Club were Matthew Daish and Phil Handy who picked up the Times and Directory Handicap Cup runners-up trophy on behalf of the A team (their plan didn’t quite come together!). Matthew had to return to the front a bit later to pick up his Junior Under 15 winner’s trophy.

Shaun Newcomb (B team) was summoned to receive his trophy for winning the Vets 50+ title, and Kai Major (H team) proudly collected his Junior Under 13 winner’s trophy. Gerard Redman (E team) picked up his runner-up trophy for the Bournemouth Closed event and Club Secretary Bev Scott-Johns collected the Division 2 runner-up trophy on behalf of the C team’s Dave Cuddon who was unable to attend.

A huge cheer went up from the New Milton table when it was announced that Club President Bob Fagan had won the prestigious Elsie Carrington Trophy for Sportsmanship. Bob, who was there with proud wife Sandy, joins the pantheon of club members who previously received this accolade, namely Julie Smillie and Shaun Newcomb. Bob always comes smiling through each table tennis match, regardless of how many “nets and edges” go against him, and quickly apologises for those that go for him. Win or lose, Bob is always the same, with a firm and friendly handshake after every match.  A delighted Bob is shown receiving his well-deserved accolade from Alex Perry.

Association Chairman Phil Hadley congratulated the winners and runners-up, and thanked the organisers of the Presentation Evening and the Tournament Organisers and Umpires. In that heady company was County Umpire Andrew Daish from the New Milton Club, and Club Secretary Bev Scott-Johns who gained his County Umpire spurs at the tournament finals night. League Results Secretary and Club Treasurer Malcolm Floyd was also thanked for the major part that he played in the production of the Association Annual Newsletter “A League Of Our Own”, copies of which were placed on every table. All in all, a very good evening for the New Milton Table Tennis Club. 

Pictured below are Phil Handy & Matthew Daish receiving their Times and Directory Runners-Up trophies, then Matthew proudly displaying his Junior Under 15 cups.

Shaun Newcomb looks rather pleased with his Vets 50+ cups, as does Kai Major with his cups for winning the Junior Under 15 title.

And last but not least is Gerard Redman receiving his runner-up trophy for the Bournemouth Closed Event.

Now that the Bournemouth and District Table Tennis league programme has finished, the New Milton Club can take stock of the final league tables with a mixture of pleasure and pain. The top three divisions make better reading for the club than the lower three where three of the club’s teams have been relegated to lower divisions.

The A team (Captain Steve Hemmings, Matthew Daish, Phil Handy & Umit Kaya) more than held their own in the Premier to finish third out of six teams.

In Div 1, the B team (Captain Shaun Newcomb, Brian Bickell, Zoltan Karip-Barath, John Millward & Julie Smillie) staved off relegation fears mid-way through the season to finish precisely mid-table thanks to a better games difference than Merton B.

Div 2 saw the C, E & D teams clustered together in third, fourth and fifth places respectively. The E team (Captain Frank Handy, Andrew, Peter & Simon Daish, Bobo Jiang and Gerard Redman) were top of the pile for most of the season and only slipped out of the top two in their penultimate match of the campaign. The in-form C team (Captain Dave Cuddon, Malcolm Floyd, Svet Ignatov & Matt Winter) deprived their E team of third place in their final match of the season against the D team (Captain Terry Jenvey, Bob Fagan and Chris Pusey. The D’s other squad member Roy Hobbs was out most of the season through injury).

The final week saw the F and G teams slug it out together in Div 3 to see who would drop down to Div 4, as they started the week second from bottom and third from bottom respectively. It ended up a draw which meant that the F’s (Captain Malcolm Nash, Ian Linney, Sylvia Smith & Eddie Tompkins) went down instead of the G’s (Captain Bev Scott-Johns, Simon Golding, Bill Page & Clive Pitts) who finished up third from bottom.

Going into the final week, the H team (Captain Les Smith, Kai Major, John Parkhouse & Dan Williams) and the J team (Captain Malcolm Douglas, Geoff Biggs, Dee Flanagan, Keith Kensley & Mike Roberts) were already doomed, so their local derby match simply determined who would end up bottom and second from bottom of Div 4. The J’s lost so they remained bottom, which was particularly disappointing for them as this was essentially the same team who were promoted from Div 5 only last season.

In Div 5, the K team squad (Lucy Craddock, Fern Daish, Campbell Golding, Lisa McGivney, Alex Whitehead & Lynn Willrich) did extremely well to finish up fifth out of eleven teams. The Kays really came into their own in the second half of the season, only losing two out of their ten matches. If the squad remains unchanged for the next season they could well be in contention for a promotion place. Although the L team came bottom, the big squad of Captain Sibyl Bartlett, Richard Brockbank, Richard Clampin, Bill Collinge, Dane Major, Andrew & Dominic Stainton and Sue Wootton-Freeman remained undaunted throughout a challenging season.  Full league tables are below:-

New Milton A had made it through to the final of the Annual Times & Directory Handicap Cup and the C team had got through to the semi-finals of the Plate competition, both against sides from the Merton Club. The A team (Umit Kaya, Steve Hemmings and Phil Handy) were hoping to make it third time lucky as they had come runners-up in 2010/2011 and 2011/2012. Unfortunately it wasn’t to be as they lost 3-5 against fellow Premier team Merton A comprising Patrick Hurley (+7), Mark Butler (+2) and Mark Smith (+8).

Handy playing off +6 kept his team in the match with a terrific hat-trick against very stiff operation, but Kaya (+8) and Hemmings (+6) weren’t able to add to the tally. Kaya came the closer as he just lost to Butler 14-31, 31-26, 29-31 in the fourth match and the pressure was really on in the eighth end as he took on Smith to save the match. Playing off identical handicaps, it was a really tight match but Kaya just tantalisingly lost out 29-31, 29-31.

The C team of Dave Cuddon, Malcolm Floyd & Svet Ignatov (pictured below) were told some days before the match that their opposition Merton G (Div 3) were only able to field two players in their semi-final of the Plate competition. This meant that Milton (Div 2) only had to win two of their matches on the night to go through to the Final, and it got off to a really good start as Ignatov (playing off +16) beat Paul Nelson (+17) in the first match 31-29, 31-29. With the Final only one win away, the wheels then fell off the wagon as Milton lost the next four matches which made it level at 4-4. The pressure was on Floyd (+14) as he took on Ray Davis (+17) and was blown away in the first end to lose 20-31, but recovered to win the second 31-21 to set up a nail-biting finale. Floyd defended doggedly but was often caught out by Davis’s powerful attack on both wings to lose 28-31. So near yet so far!

CUP FINAL
Merton A (Premier) 5 New Milton A (Premier) 3
Umit Kaya (+8) 0, Steve Hemmings (+6) 0, Phil Handy (+6) 3.

PLATE SEMI-FINAL
Merton G (Div 3) 5 New Milton C (Div 2) 4
Svet Ignatov (+16) 1, Dave Cuddon (+15) 0, Malcolm Floyd (+14) 0.
NB: Merton G only had two players.

The New Milton Table Tennis Club came up with three wins in the final week of the Bournemouth and District league, all of which came at the expense of their own teams in the four local derbies. The A, B and E teams weren’t in action as they all had byes in the final week, which left the other teams slugging it out for bragging rights.

It was sweet revenge for the C team in Div 2 as they reversed a first-round 4-6 defeat against the D team with a 9-1 trouncing in their return match. This maximum-pointer leap-frogged them over their E team to third place after a stunning string of results in the run-in.

Div 3 saw the F team vie with their G team for a relegation place as they started the week second from bottom and third from bottom respectively. With both teams fighting for their lives, the F team managed to overcome a 3-7 first-round defeat with a 5-5 draw, but it wasn’t enough to prevent them falling through the trap-door to Div 4.

In Div 4, the H and J teams were already doomed so it was just a matter of who ended up at the bottom of the pile. This encounter resulted in the Jays staying bottom as they lost by 2-8 despite beating their club mates 6-4 first time around. “H” captain Les Smith (pictured below) definitely saved his best for last as he came up with his first (and last) hat-trick of the campaign.

The Div 5 clash between the K and bottom-placed L team went with the form book as the Kays did the double over their stable mates with a 6-4 win at the Arnewood School.

Full results details are below:- Read the rest of this entry →

The New Milton Table Tennis Club had a poor week in the Bournemouth and District league as they could only muster one win out of ten matches. In their last match of the season, the E team were held to a 5-5 draw against Bmth Sports G whom they walloped by 8-2 at home in the first round of matches. Milton had been top of Div 2 for most of the season but a poor run of results in the run-up deprived them of a promotion slot as they dropped out of the top two.

The C team, also in Div 2, were the only Milton side to register a win as their 8-2 hammering of North Bmth in their penultimate match vastly improved on their first round draw. The C team needed at least a 8-2 win from their last match (against the D team) to take over third place from their club mates in the E team. This looked a tall order as the C’s lost 4-6 first time around but they did it in style as they walloped the D team 9-1 to end up in third place.

A special mention for promising new signing Bill Collinge who marked his Div 5 debut with an impressive hat-trick which gave his L team a point in their 3-7 defeat by Shamrock B in Div 5. Also worthy of a mention in despatches is England veteran Brian Bickell (pictured below) who scored a hat-trick for his B side in Div 1, and new signing Alex Whitehead who played up a division but still came up with a treble for the H team in Div 4.

Full results details are below:- Read the rest of this entry →

The New Milton Table Tennis Club teams won four out of their eight matches in the Bournemouth and District league last week, three of them representing reversals of first round defeats. In the Premier, the A team beat Merton A 7-3 in their own back yard having lost 4-6 at home, and at the opposite end of the league in Div 5 the K team beat Bmth Sports S 8-2 having lost 3-7 first time around. The biggest turn-round came in Div 1 as captain Shaun Newcomb’s hat-trick helped his B team to beat Lynwood B 7-3 at home having lost 1-9 to them down at Parkstone.

Div 2 saw the C team (pictured below) gain more ground on their E team as the C’s improved on their first round 7-3 win over Merton D with an 8-2 victory chez Merton. The E’s promotion prospects took a bit of a tumble as they lost again to Merton E, this time by 3-7 at Mudeford Wood. For the first time this season, the E team drop out of the top two to be replaced by their victors Merton E. Things got even worse for the E’s as Lynwood C had to concede their match against Bmth Sports F which reinforced Bourne’s title claims thanks to the gifted four points.

Full results details appear below:- Read the rest of this entry →

There was a break in the Bournemouth and District Table Tennis league last week as the week was given over to the Times & Directory Handicap Competition, ie the semi-finals of the Cup and the quarter-finals of the Plate.

The Premier’s New Milton A (Steve Hemmings, Phil Handy & Matthew Daish) booked their place in the Cup Final as they beat Winton YMCA B (Div 1) fairly comfortably by 5-2 aided and abetted by a hat-trick from Handy. This will be the A team’s third crack at the Final having been runners-up in 2010/2011 and 2011/12, so hopefully it will be third time lucky for them.

There were four New Milton teams left in the quarter-finals of the Plate, but remarkably none of them were drawn against the other. The only team to go through to the semi-finals were the C team (Svet Ignatov, Malcolm Floyd & Malcolm Nash) pictured below, who scraped a 5-4 win over Div 4’s Winton YMCA E. Malcolm Nash played up a division and had his 21 start reduced to 15 as he had to take on the handicap of the Div 2 player whom he replaced. Nash played very well but the five forfeited points proved a bridge too far so he went home empty handed. Ignatov won all three of his matches, while Floyd playing off +14 lost to Duncan Feltham (+23) in the first game of the evening but subsequently beat Duncan’s Dad Harold (+18). And so it was level-pegging at 4-4 when Floyd took on Will Sharpe (+21) in the ninth and final game. Floyd took the first end 31-29, but just lost the second by a nail-biting 30-31 to set up a very tense finale. However, Floyd kept his nerve and defended doggedly to win 31-27 to take his side into the semi-finals.

The G team’s Plate match against fellow Div 3 side Merton G also went right down to the wire in the ninth game, but Bill Page (+21) unfortunately lost to Merton’s Peter Dexter (+17) 27-31, 29-31. Progress also ground to a halt for the D team (Chris Pusey, Terry Jenvey & Bob Fagan) as they lost 1-5 to Winton YMCA C, and the F team (Malcolm Nash, Sylvia Smith & Eddie Tomkins) who lost 3-6 to Nimrod A. Full result details are below:-

Read the rest of this entry →