GUILDFORD TABLE TENNIS LEAGUE PRESS REPORT 20
This week, in the Guildford Table Tennis League Premier Division, away from the hurly burly of title challenges I watched a match which fairly typifies the bread and butter aspect of the League in which Merrow B beat Burymead A 6-4. Over 80’s European singles champion Ramesh Bhalla turned out, and there were two prodigies of the 70’s coaching scheme, Mark Handcock and Richard Seymour on show, still playing superb Table Tennis- Seymour won all three just edging out Handcock in a ‘battle royal’ John Callcut, past Chair of the Association, pushed back the years with a solid performance gaining a crucial point for the Merrow club and skipper Graham Faulkner weighed in with two. Burymead fielded a newcomer to the league Axel Raeder- just another evening in the Associations Chronicles
In Division One Merrow E scored a massive 9-1 win over Aftermath B to finally pressurise Ash and breath life into the battle for supremacy at the table top. College B took bragging rights over their C side 7-3. Tim O’Reilly was unbeaten and Stephen Kamphausen offered some resistance taking two singles plus the doubles. An interesting match was between Godalming D and Abinger A in which Brendan Bayley lost three all in five sets and then helped to take the doubles in five to gain the only point for Abinger.
The Second Division saw a good win by Bramley D over Aftermath D 7-3 with David Phillips, Gary Smith and Gary Nicholson supreme on the night with only Frank Roberts offering resistance with two singles.
Division Three, and Aftermath E soared to the dizzy heights of top on the back of a 10-0 triumph against Godalming L. John Setterfield, Dave Thomas and Alan Webb starred.