Gloucester's top juniors battle it out at the Schools Individual table tennis championships

The Gloucestershire Schools Individual table

tennis championships were held at Robin Greaves Sports Centre,

Waterwells, Quedgeley on Saturday 5 January. The events held were Boys

U11, Boys U13, Boys U16, Boys U19 and Girls U16 and a total of

46 competitors took part from all over the county. The boys U11 had a

total of 8 entries who played in two groups of 4. The semi finals saw

Ben Tyndall (Gloucester) beat Ryan Marsden (Cheltenham) and Irek

Nawiesniak (Cheltenham) beat Stanley Shilton (Stroud). The final was a

one sided affair with Ben running out a comfortable winner. The Boys

U13 had 15 entries who played in 4 groups. Olly Tyndall (Gloucester)

beat Rasmus Haycraft (Stroud) in the first semi final and Shrey Bhardwaj

(Cheltenham) saw off the challenge of Michael Pang (Gloucester) in the

second semi final. Olly proved to be too strong for Shrey in the final

winning in 3 close games. The Boys U16 saw the largest entry and the 17

players played in 4 groups. Top seed Ben Roberts (Gloucester) defeated

Ben Glover (Stroud) in 4 close games in the first semi final, whilst

Billy Shilton (Stroud) scored a narrow 3-2 victory over Owen Berry

(Gloucester) in the second. Billy raised his game to defeat Ben 3-0 to

take the title. The Boys U19 had just two entrants but the match was a

thriller with Sam Turner (Gloucester) just edging out Sam Warner

(Cheltenham) in 5 very close games. The Girls U16 was a group of 4 and

Margaret Pang (Gloucester) won all her matches although she was pushed

all the way by runner-up Emily Philp (Stroud) with Margaret winning 11-9

in the final game. All the winners go forward to the national schools

finals at the Doncaster Dome on Saturday 20 April. I hope they all do

Gloucestershire proud. Thanks to all the players for attending on the

day and for their sportsmanship and good manners. A big thanks also go

to the small army of helpers who helped set the venue up, steward and

umpire throughout the afternoon, and then cleared up at the end.