Posts in category: TTI News

The Senior Six Nations Championships has been and gone, but it has certainly left its mark following a breath-taking three days play in Lisburn. The event, supported by Lisburn & Castlereagh City Council, lived up to all the hype as top players from Ireland and beyond gathered for what was a real festival of Table Tennis.

The Irish men’s team, led by national champion Paul McCreery, took its rightful place as Silver medallists behind a fine Scottish team, in the expansive Lisburn Racquets Club, while Ashley Givan led the line for the women’s side as they claimed a podium Bronze.
 
England took the combined title (23 points) ahead of the Irish (19 points), but will rue the 3-2 defeat at the hands of the Irish team of McCreery, Gavin Maguire, Ashley Robinson and Ryan Farrell, as they were denied the coveted men’s title.
 
McCreery was clearly team supremo as the Nottingham University graduate showed table precision in picking up two singles wins against old rivals England. Both of these wins were epic 5 set encounters, with the second one in particular going right to the wire as the saintfield man recovered from 4 match points down against the English No.1, Helshan Weerasinghe, to secure victory and level the team score at 2-2. In the decider it was time for Gavin Maguire to enter the fray once more. Gav, who lost a big battle with Weerasinghe earlier in the contest, dusted himself off to produce a quality display to beat England No.2 Alex Ramsden 3-1, earning Ireland a hard-fought, edge of the seat victory.

Scotland proved too strong in the final showdown against the host nation, winning 3-0. In truth, the score didn’t really refect the tie as a whole, as all three matches were tight encounters. Paul went down 3-2 to Craig Howieson, and this was followed by an equally nip and tuck affair between Ashley Robinson and Gavin Rumgay. Unfortunately, Ireland came out at the wrong end of another 5 setter here despite a brilliant battling display by Ashley. The doubles was another close one, as the newly formed pair of McCreery/Robinson showed huge quality against the established pairing of Rumgay/Howieson, but it wasn’t enough in the end as the boys went down 3-1.
 
Ashley Givan stepped up to the plate in leading our young womens team to a bronze medal.  Ashley, Katie McGlone and Rebecca Finn fought hard  throughout the team event, with victories over Guernsey and Scotland earning bronze. The best win came in the opening round of matches as the girls found themselves 2-1 down against Guernsey following a doubles loss. This is where Ashley Givan produced for the hosts, winning 3-1 against the highly rated Alice Loveridge. Katie then stepped up under the pressure to beat Chloe LeTissier 3-0 to seal the win. 

Despite their best efforts, Wales and England proved that bit too strong. However the girls had their chances, particularly against the Welsh. Again Ashley Givan showed her best form here, beating Welsh Number 2 Megan Phillips 3-0 before pushing their top player Charlotte Carey all the way before eventually going down in 5 engrossing sets. 

Overall, a bronze medal was a fine result for the young Irish team on show.

With the team event over, Singles Sunday was upon us as the Individuals event took centre stage. Despite some absolutely enthralling encounters, as well as some outstanding individual displays by Irish players, the host nation fell short in their bid to claim Individual Medals following the success of the team event.

In the men’s singles, Paul McCreery was perhaps the most unfortunate of all, as he was drawn against top seed Rumgay in the last 16 following the Scotsmans shock defeat in the Group stage to Welsh youngster Chris Griffiths. Despite yet another crowd pleasing display of table tennis, which included this 29 SHOT RALLY, Paul couldn’t quite shake off the battling Scottish No1 as he fell short by the narrowest of margins 12-10 in the fifth set. 

Elsewhere Gavin Maguire couldn’t quite find his best form as he went down in straight sets to the in form Craig Howieson in the Quarter Finals. Amazingly, this is a match that may have been avoided on another day, as Ireland’s own Owen Cathcart, an extra in the singles draw, pushed the Scottish No 2 to the brink in the last 16, leading 10-9 with chances to take a 2-1 lead. Unfortunately, experience told as Howieson proved too strong in the end, despite an outstanding display of agressive table tennis by the 13 year old Belfast boy. 

Meanwhile Ashley Robinson also fell victim to the Rumgay loss in the group stage, as he faced off once again with the top seed. Like the previous day, the Ulsterman was a match and more for the Scottish player, as the crowd were treated to another hugely entertaining battle. However, as was the story ALL weekend, Rumgay found a way to get the job done as he pipped Ashley 11-8 in the 5th set. 

This wasn’t where Irish interest ended in the men’s singles however, as Zak Wilson (another singles extra) showed what a player he is as he stormed to the quarter finals. This was following big victories over Welsh No.2 Dan O’Connell, Guernsey No 1 Garry Dodd and Ireland’s Alan Walsh. In the quarters Zak had his chances, but like many matches for the Irish on singles Sunday, fell marginally short as he lost out to England’s No 2 Alex Ramsden 12-10 in the 4th Set – an excellent performance!

On the women’s side, Chloe O’Halloran provided the first shock of the day, beating Ireland leading light of the team event Ashley Givan, by a 3-2 scoreline in the group stage, and with it knocking Ashley out of the event. Chloe went on to the quarter finals, where despite a valiant effort, she was beaten 3-1 by the experienced Welsh No 2 Megan Phillips.

Elsewhere, Katie McGlone and Rebecca Finn also earned quarter final spots as they negotiated their way through the group stages. However, this was as far as our young girls would go as they were drawn against the eventual finalists, Carey and Karina LeFevre respectively. They both fought hard, with Rececca taking a set off the soon to be champion, however it wasn’t quite enough in the end – valuable experience nonetheless for our youthful group of female players.

Overall, it was a very positive event from an Irish perspective. Our Men and Women showed immense quality and most importantly, that they are making progress for all to see. 

A final mention must also be made for the event itself, which ran without fault from start to finish thanks to the monumental effort put in by all  of the volunteers, particularly tournament Referee Tony Martin, assistant Con O’Ceadaigh, Table Tennis Ulster, Jamie and Stuart McConkey, the TTI Events Unit (Led by Tony Farrell) and of course the many umpires and officials who assisted thoughout the weekend. From everyone in Table Tennis Ireland, we thank you for your invaluable contribution to this great event.

Team Event Final places: 
Men’s Team: 1. Scotland; 2 Ireland; 3 England; 4. Wales; 5. Guernsey; 6. Jersey. 
Women’s Team: 1. England; 2. Wales; 3. Ireland; 4. Guernsey; 5. Scotland.
Combined Team Places:  1. England; 2. Ireland; 3. Wales; 4. Scotland; 5. Guernsey; 6. Jersey.

For the full results from the Individuals please click here

Top seeds Gavin Maguire and Hannah Lynch-Dawson swept all before them in Tallaght over the weekend to claim their respective men’s and women’s Leinster GP singles titles at the National Basketball Arena.

Maguire was untroubled for most of the day, as he brushed aside Dylan Grace and Alan Walsh in the Quarter and Semi Finals. In the Final he was due a stern test against top Junior Zak Wilson. Wilson was in fine form having battled through a tough side of the draw. He overcame the experienced Na Ning in 5 sets in the quarters, before he accounted for an in form Peter Graham (who himself had gotten the better of 2nd seed Ryan Farrell in his quarter) in the semis in 3 close sets.

However the final was all Maguire, as the soon to be number 1 ranked player asserted himself from the off to snuff out any hope that his young opponent had of causing an upset. The Dubliner prevailed in 3 sets to make it back to back National Ranking Titles following his victory at the Irish Senior Classification.

In the Women’s event, Hannah Lynch-Dawson went in as top seed and pre-tournament favourite and she duly delivered. However she didn’t have it all her own way. She was forced to battle her way past Munster’s Chloe O’Halloran in the Semis before she was faced with her biggest scare of all.

In the final she was pitted against surprise package Mia O’Rahilly Egan, and the 13 year old Leinster girl showed just what a young player she is as she pushed her more senior opponent all the way in a pulsating encounter. Mia led after taking the first set and Hannah was forced to save game points in the second to avoid falling 2-0 behind. Having rescued that set the fight didn’t end there as Mia levelled the match at 2 sets all before racing into a 3-0 lead in the decider. It was here that Hannah really showed another gear as she pulled herself back into the set before racing away to take the match and with it the Leinster Grand Prix Title.

To see the full results of the weekend, including the Banded, Veterens, Restricted and U21 events please click here

Yesterday saw the return home of the successful duo who represented Ireland at the Czech Para Table Tennis Open in Ostrava.  Both Tom Davis (Class 10) and Conor O’Callaghan (Class 6) managed to pick up a bronze medal in their respective team events.

Tom teamed up with the Class 9 Singles Gold Medallist Koyo Iwabuchi from Japan.  And in a mixed Class 9-10 event they finished top of their group which also included Germany and Poland.  Their other most notable win was over the host team of the Czech Republic in the quarter-finals.  Unfortunately they came up against a very strong Russian team in the semi-final, and lost narrowly (3-2.)

Meanwhile Conor was partnered by Raimondo Alecci from Italy and Vjekoslav Gregorovic from Croatia in the Class 6-7 event.  Despite losing to a strong Czech/Belgian team in the group stage, they had terrific wins over both Russia and Japan before losing the semi-final to eventual silver medalists Romania/Israel.

Earlier in the week both players had played the singles events and Conor, on his debut senior international tournament, played really well despite not qualifying for the knockout stages.  He took a set off both Bobrov from Israel (world-ranked 13) and Alecci from Italy (world-ranked 14.)  At 14 years of age, he certainly was not out of place in the senior ranks.

In the Class 10 singles Tom had superb wins over Nikita Perevozchikov from Russia and Ralf Meyer from Germany.  He lost narrowly (3-1) in the group to Ivan Karabec from the Czech Republic who is world-ranked 5.  Tom eventually went out in the quarter-finals to Trunov from Ukraine, narrowly missing out on his first international singles medal.

National Coach Ronan Rooney was full of praise for both players following their performances.  “They fully deserved to win their team-event medals, and Tom in particular was very unfortunate to miss out on a singles medal.  Conor also played well and has already shown that he belongs in this company.  He will benefit greatly from this experience.”

On behalf of Table Tennis Ireland, we would like to congratulate Coach Rooney and our two young players on their performance in Ostrava.

It was always going to require a monumental effort from our men’s team and despite the many positives, relegation from the Challenge division was the outcome following a gruelling 4 days in Russia. 

Promoted to the heights of the 2nd tier of European Table Tennis prior to the event, Ekateringburg presented the Irish mens team of Gavin Maguire, Paul McCreery and Ashley Robinson (led by NPC John Murphy) with a unique opportunity to retain their place in the division and with it, secure a place in the European League.

The Irish started their campaign on Friday 25th, with matches against Turkey and Norway ahead of them on the opening days play.

Turkey were first up and despite encouraging performances from all 3 players, our boys went down 3-0 against a quality European outfit. Later in the evening was the group meeting with Norway. Here was perhaps the highlight of the tournament for the boys, who stormed to a 3-0 win against a strong Table Tennis nation. Ashley Robinson was the star man here, using his razor sharp serve/receive and half-long attack to get the better of No1 player Espen Ronneberg by a 3-2 scoreline – excellent work against a much higher ranked opponent. 

The final group match took place on Saturday morning as the boys went down 3-0 against a quality Slovak team. Gavin Maguire noted afterwards that it was probably the best team our men had played against in a major championship. Despite this, Paul McCreery had chances at No3 against Thomas Keineth, but the experienced German born player was a bit too strong in the end, taking the match 3-1. 

Next up was a date with Finland on Sunday, and having finished 3rd in the group to get a slightly more favourable match, this one was huge. With No1 player Benedek Olah in their ranks, it was always going to be a massive challenge however and so it proved as we went down 1-3 – with Gavin Maguire taking the solitary win for the Irish at the number 3 position. A massive turning point here came in the 2nd match, as Paul McCreery went down 11-9 in the 5th to the Finnish No2 player. 

This left the Irish men in a battle for 29-32 positions. Only back to back wins now would ensure survival in the Challenge division. The first of these two matches was against old rivals Estonia. Coach Murphy tweeted before this one saying that the boys needed a big performance, and it must be said that he certainly got what he asked from his team.

Despite finding themselves clinging on after losing the opening 2 rubbers by the tightest of margins, Ashley led a resurgent Irish charge with victory over the defensive skills of Alexsander Lushin. Paul then produced a huge performance to defeat the highly rated Smirnov in 5 sets. This left Gavin Maguire in the pressure cooker against the ice cool Vallot Vainula. Despite a fine performance, Gav couldn’t quite complete the comeback as he went down in 5 sets, meaning the men had to settle for a place in the Standard Division next time around.

Positives were gained later in the day however, as the boys managed to regroup to beat Norway once again, this time by a 3-2 scoreline, to finish the tournament with a victory. Gavin made the difference here, as his 2 wins on top of Ashleys win at No3 were enough to seal victory.

Overall, there were many positives despite the disappointment for our young mens team at this years European Championships. To come within striking distance of returning to European League is a measure of the level our guys are at.

They are an example to us all and there is no doubt they will be back again!