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Progress Take on the World
24 Apr 2006
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Progress Players at World Championships
London Progress take on the world. A little exaggerated maybe, but for four of the all-conquering British League Champions, that is exactly what is on the agenda this week. Fresh from their heroic eighth consecutive British League title, Darius Knight, Jason Sugrue, Colum Slavin and Marco Essomba are in Germany for this year's World championships: Darius representing England, Jason and Colum lining up for Ireland and Marco doing his national duty for Cameroon. Of course, none of these three teams are expected to reach the latter stages of this competition, but the sheer honour and thrill of representing their country is reward enough. Any unexpected wins are an added bonus. And with Darius teeming up with Paul Drinkall, it is not impossible to imagine these two English stars causing some ripples on the world stage over the next few years.
West London Academy Shine
On the home front, London Progress show no sign of resting. This weekend the club hosted two large junior tournaments; the West London qualifying section of the LJTTS and on the Sunday, the Middlesex Junior Closed Championships. In both events, youngsters from the West London Academy, a TTK funded squad coached by Jason Sugrue, put in some outstanding performances with Daniel Basterfield, Jack Ward, Tony Wilkinson, Joe Hopla, Sullivan Morais, Daniel Jago and Bradley King all chalking up some great wins. It was an all - WLA final on the Saturday with Basterfield getting the better of Wilkinson in the Band A final and Jack Ward having a glorious day on the Sunday beating Alex Fegredo, Jack Basterfield and Tony Wilkinson to reach the final of the Cadet Boys event, where he finally succumbed to Wembley High No1, Fatlum Sedeku.
Matt Ware Leads the Way
Further afield, the top Progress cadets were in fine form, sweeping into the finals of the Johnny Leech Cup with two emphatic wins against Sunderland and Birmingham. The team of Garth Kinlock, Matt Ware and David McBeth look like strong contenders for silverware next month. The latter two performed particularly well in the National Cadet championships last week with Matt Ware going all the way to the finals.
Level 1 Coaching Course
Three important events are due to be hosted by London Progress at their Southall venue over the next few weeks. For the next two Sundays, the club, in conjunction with the ETTA, will be hosting a Level 1 Coaching course, led by experienced tutor, Mr John Standing. Successful candidates will be then invited to upgrade their qualifications to Level 2. Since the arrival of TTK/Greenhouse in promoting schools table tennis, there has been a rapid increase in full time coaching posts in London. This has contributed greatly to a renaissance of London Junior table tennis and the demand for good quality coaches who can relate to young people has grown proportionately. Keep up the great work TTK! The course takes place on April 30th and May 7th but normal practice will still be available on those days.
A Sport for All
The second important event in May will be the inauguration of the West London Table Tennis Tournament for People with Learning Difficulties.This will be a particularly exciting project and the initial response from West London has been very promising. The highlight of the day will be an exhibition and coaching session by the Great Britain Learning Disabilities Table Tennis Team.The tournament takes place on Friday 26th May, the day preceding the GLC,between 10am and 2pm. If you have a few spare hours on that day please consider coming down to join the squad of volunteers needed to make things run smoothly.
Greater London Championships
Finally, May will conclude with the annual Greater London Championships on the 27th & 28th May at Southall. Junior events are scheduled for the Saturday and Senior events will be played on the Sunday. Entry forms can be downloaded from the ETTA website. Click on 'competitions' and scroll down to 'entry forms'. Closing date is the 12th May so don't delay!!!
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Jon Kaufman
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