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Update from Moscow – World Team Championships

Group I

Following a mixed start to Group I, with one win and three losses, Team Ireland still had an outside chance of qualifying into the top half of Division 3 going in to the last group game with Dominican Republic. This was always going to be a difficult task for the Irish, as in Ju LIN, the Caribbean island nation has one of the World’s top 100 ranked players. LIN was in terrific form, defeating Keith KNOX in straight sets to put the Dominicans one up. MCCREERY was next into the fray for Ireland and despite dropping the first set, he recorded a 3-1 victory over VILA BATISTA, who is 250 places ahead of McCreery in the World Rankings and a significant scalp to take. Murphy then put Ireland into a 2-1 lead, also defeating a significantly higher ranked player in Emil SANTOS. McCreery then got the opportunity to take on Ju LIN and will be delighted to have taken a set against him, eventually losing 3-1, to send the match into a winner take all decider. All the pressure was on Keith Knox, but VILA BATISTA made the most of his experience at this level to defeat KNOX and send the Irish into the bottom half of Division 3.

Play Offs – Positions 61-72

Team Ireland, having missed out on the chance to gain promotion, had to pick themselves up and hope that they could improve on their 2008 finish of 65th place. Their first play-off game was against the Central Asian Republic of Uzbekistan. The Uzbekis have a similar standing in World table tennis to the Irish, and this was expected to be a tense battle. In the first game, McCreery was pushed all the way by Grigory DRAGA, taking the 5th set 14-12 to put the Irish ahead. MURPHY was next up, and he will be disappointed to have lost, again in 5 sets, to KENJAEV, a player who is just outside the top 1000 in the World. Knox was then in to battle, still seeking his first victory of the tournament. He delivered his best performance of the event, defeating HOLIKOV to send the Irish into a 2-1 lead. McCreery was also pushed to 5 sets by KENJAEV, but managed to hold his nerve and close out the final set 11-7 to record a good win for Ireland.

After a gruelling match against the Uzbekis, Ireland were drawn against Algeria, who they had been beaten by in the Group stage without recording a single victory. Algeria were confident and decided to experiment with a different team selection, only Kherouf remaining from the group stage. Kherouf had beaten Daryl Strong in the first encounter, but Paul McCreery atoned for that loss with a powerful demolition of the Algerian, 11-8, 11-8, 11-4. Murphy was then defeated 3-1 by Larbi BOURIAH. Knox was picked again, and again he did not let anyone down, recording a fine victory over Aissa BELKADI, before McCreery put the final nail in the Algerians coffin with a five set victory over BOURIAH.

Ireland now play-off for positions 61-64, with South Africa first up this afternoon. This will be a stern test for the Irish, with COGILL and OVERMEYER both higher ranked than all of the Irish team.

Its been a challenging few days for the Irish Men’s Team at the World Team Championships.Drawn in a difficult group, the aim at the outset was a top 3 finish, which would give the team a chance to play for promotion to Division Two. First up was Indonesia, top seed in the Division and favourites for the Division 3 Title. Ireland struggled against their higher ranked opponents, with McCreery losing in 4 to Pramono, Murphy losing out to World Ranked 538 Santoso in 5 sets before Knox in his World Team Championships debut lost to Aji.

Next up was Moldova – Nilsson picked up his demoralised team and they delivered for him in fine style, with a 3-1 victory.Paul McCreery was in fine form, winning both of his matches, while Murphy defeated Moldova No.1 Igor Ni comfortably.

Ireland then faced two crucial matches against Algeria and Ecuador. With the first two results going as predicted, the Irish needed to spring a surprise. Unfortunately, they could not deliver as the Irish suffered 3-0 defeats in both matches. National Champion Murphy put up a resilient performance against Algerian Boudjaja(WR 433), again losing a 5 setter – this time after taking the first two sets.   McCreery opened against Ecuador with a similar performance against another higher ranked opponent – WR 523 Coello. The result was again the same – McCreery took the first two sets before the South American ramped up the gears to take a 5 set thriller.

Tonight, the Irish still have a slim chance of squeezing in to the top 3 in the group. They face Dominican Republic, who have also suffered losses to Ecuador and Indonesia. If Ireland win and Ecuador beat Algeria as expected, the Irish will tie for 3rd place with Dominican Republic.

Division 3 – Group Ihttp://www.ittf.com/ittf_team_events/team_groups_of_6_web.asp?Tour_Code=1896&s_Event_type=MGTEM&Group_no=9

Final Opponent Preview: DOMINICAN REPUBLIC – Seeded 57

Top Players

*Lin – 69

Batista – 509

Santos – 587

As the domestic season came to a close with the Senior and Junior Interprovincials, many players will have put their bat away and turned thoughts to a break away after a demanding season. For Ireland’s elite players however, the demands of the 12 month season could not be more apparent as we move towards a busy Summer for the international squads.

As of today, 3 Irish High Performance squads are abroad representing their country, while at home Junior and Cadet players will have their sights set on a possible call up to the European Youths in Turkey in late July.

Starting at the youngest age group, cadets Ryan McConkey and Katie McGlone have had a fantastic week training with some of Europe’s top young talents and under the guidance of leading European coaches, which will surely reap massive benefits for their game. They were fortunate enough to be selected for the ETTU’s ‘Eurokids’ programme, which was held in Italy this week. Following 2 days of intense training, both players played the Eurokids tournament today. McGlone had some good wins, with a particularly good win over the intriguingly named Liz Lethal of Luxembourg. Her group was particularly challenging and she was unfortunate not to progress after a count back. McConkey was also eliminated at the group stage, but also had a good win against Malta’s Dylan Zammit. Both players enter the 13+ play-offs; however the results at this level are not so important – it is the experience of playing in Europe under the tutelage of some of the game’s finest tactical and technical brains that will be of most benefit. Coach Louise Long has also been working with the top coaches at Lingano and is sure to have developed as a coach from the experience

Moving from Italy to Belgium, six players from Ireland are currently en route to play in the 3 day International Youth Cup in Belgium. This 3 day team and individual event sees teams from all across Europe travel to Hasselt TTC and it is sure to be a fantastic experience for these top young players. Best wishes to all, particularly those making their first appearance representing their country. Top cadet and National Cadet Champion Ryan Farrell will look to make an impression on his first foray to a competition of this nature, while Alan Walsh will be making his international debut – a proud moment for the player, his parents and Ballincollig TTC.

Full Hasselt Squad

Ryan Farrell, Kevin Hutchinson, Neil Irwin, Jonathan Porter, Eric Sheckleton, Alan Walsh.

Finally, at the very elite of the game, the entire Irish table tennis community will be hoping for a positive Irish performance at the World Team Championships in Russia. National Senior Champion John Murphy has been in camp in Sweden for 2 weeks training for this event, and he will be joined by 17 year old Paul McCreery, who has soared up both the National (finishing the season as No.1 in Ireland) and World (up to 760 in the World, a jump of 250 places in just 12 months) Ranking over the past season. The squad is completed by the experienced Daryl Strong of Ulster and Keith Knox, who has made a remarkable comeback from injury over the past year, recording an impressive semi-final performance at the Butterfly National Seniors. 

First up on 23rd May is top seed Indonesia, with the last match in their group on May 26th also a tough one with Ju Lin’s Dominican Republic team sure to present a stern test of Ireland’s promotion prospects. In between, Ireland, coached by Peter Nilsson, face Moldova, Ecuador and Algeria.

So for our top players, there is no let-up as the demands on the international player continues to grow. ITTAWeb wishes all of the players representing their country over the next week the very best of luck.

A large Irish squad of 6 has been selected to travel to Hasselt, Belgium for this weekend’s International Youth Cup. This 3 day team and individual event sees teams from all across Europe travel to Hasselt TTC and it is sure to be a fantastic experience for these top young players. Best wishes to all, particularly those making their first appearance representing their country.

Full Squad

Ryan Farrell

Kevin Hutchinson

Neil Irwin

Jonathan Porter

Eric Sheckleton

Alan Walsh

Irish table tennis sensation Paul McCreery produced the performance of his career to date at the ITTF World Junior Circuit event in Barcelona, culminating in a top 8 finish in this world standard event on Saturday. Breaking away from exam preparation to join up with Junior international team-mates Sam Logue and Declan O’Brien, McCreery was straight into his stride with some good wins in the Team event. It was in the Singles where his tournament really took off, with some incredible performances to make the quarter-finals.

McCreery was drawn in the Group Stage against Dorian Nicolle of France and Lewis Gray of England. McCreery caused a surprise by defeating Nicolle in straight sets, before claiming the group win with a 3-1 victory over England international Gray.

This put McCreery through to the last 64 against Otsuka of Japan. Otsuka has a similar World Ranking to McCreery, but it looked like the talented Dundoland youngster had too much class as he raced into a 3-0 lead. Otsuka pulled two games back, but McCreery showed good maturity to close out the match on a scroeline of 4-2.  In the last 32, he faced Tristan Flore, another French player. This was a classic ding-dong battle, with the players exchanging sets until the score reached 3-3 to set up a final set decider. Flore, ranked 52 in the World Junior Rankings and over 200 places above McCreery in the Senior rankings would have been expecting to progress here. However, McCreery again showed supreme battling qualities and some wonderful play to take the final set 11-8 and progress to the last 16.

This was very much unchartered waters for McCreery at this level of international competition. Facing Sweden’s Jesper Hedlund however, he looked comfortable and doled out a straight sets defeat – 13-11,11-9,13-11,11-7 to reach the Quarter-Final. Here he faced top seed and eventual runner-up Patrick Franziska of Germany. Franziska is ranked 175 in the World Senior rankings and he had too much for McCreery, winning 4-0. McCreery will be delighted to have reached the latter stages of a world-class international competition – many of the players in the Spanish Open were using the event as preparation for the Youth Olympic Games and are of World class standard. It also sets McCreery up for an assault on the European Youth Championships in Turkey later this Summer.

Speaking about McCreery’s performance, ITTA Technical Director John O’Donoghue was delighted:

“This was an outstanding result for Paul. He beat some top quality players on his way to the quarter finals and he is the first Irish player to reach this stage of an ITTF Junior Circuit event. He has certainly had a superb season. He fully deserves all the success he gets as he works really hard and his commitment and dedication is second to none”

Congratulations to Paul, to coach Marcus McDonnell and to Sam Logue and Declan O’Brien who also had some good results and will have benefitted greatly from playing against players of this calibre.

Following yesterday’s draw, Ireland’s Men will face a battle to progress to the knock-out stages of Division Three  in the Liebherr World Team Championships to be held in the Russian capital city of Moscow from Sunday 23rd to Sunday 30th May 2010. Ireland have been drawn in Group I of Division Three, where they will face:

Group I

Indonesia

Algeria

Ireland

Dominican Republic

Ecuador

Moldova

Ireland will be represented at the Worlds by Butterfly National Senior Champion John Murphy, Paul McCreery(buoyed by a massive jump of 110 places in the April ITTF World Rankings to 818), Daryl Strong and Keith Knox, with Peter Nilsson coaching the team. With three teams to progress to the knock-out stages to play for places 1-12 and possible promotion, ITTA Technical Director John O’Donoghue stated:

 “This is a tough draw with top seeds Indonesia in the group but we will be competitive and with some good performances we can progress to the knock out stages”

Opposition Preview

INDONESIA – seeded 49 (top seed in Division 3)

Top Players

Santoso – 538

Maulana – 540

ALGERIA – Seeded 56

Top Players

Ouramouhne – 437

Boudjadja – 433

DOMINICAN REPUBLIC – Seeded 57

Top Players

*Lin – 69

Batista – 509

Santos – 587

ECUADOR – Seeded 65

Top Players

Mino -345

Coello – 523

*Player Spotlight – Ju Lin(Dominican Republic) – pic courtesy of ITTF

Lin is the danger player in this group, with a World Ranking of 69 and experience of playing at the highest level – the Olympic Games(Athens 2004). He is  another example of the modern day defender; originally from China but now representing the Dominican Republic, he returns the ball with varying degrees of backspin but when the opportunity arises he will attack with the forehand and is clearly at home in topspin exchanges. In many ways he is similar to the former Chinese internationals, CHEN Xinhua and DING Song, both were masters of defence and forehand topspin attacking strokes and both, like LIN Ju, had a range of services that would either bring instant success, or enable them to conclude the point on their next stroke with a strong attacking forehand topspin. The Irish players will have to be at their very best to record a win against this highly regarded player.