News Season 2007-08:

Grand Prix 15 29.7.08
Terry Osborne became the 13th different winner of the 15 Grand Prix so far beating Eddie Mitchell into second place and Tony Stead into third. Terry and Eddie both won two of the six weekly events while Tony won one as did Jonathan Evans. A total of 38 players took part.
 
European Youth Championships 12-20.7.08
Gavin Evans became the European Cadet Champion and brought home a total of four medals from the European Youth Championships in Terni, Italy. After a series of hard-fought matches, not least in the quarter-final 16 when he was 10-6 down in the deciding game, Gavin emerged from a final victory over Sweden's Hampus Soderlund as cadet champion of Europe. Gavin also won silver medals in the cadet boys' team and cadet boys' doubles events and bronze in the cadet mixed doubles.
 
Cippenham Veterans' Summer 2-Star Open Championships 6.7.08
The unseeded Hari Gehlot came through a strong field to win the Men's Singles, beating top seed Dave Harvey in the final. There were good performances also from Andy Misseldine, Chris Knight, Lee Middleton and Nigel Hodder while two other seeds, Steve hall and Fred Dove, struggled to overcome the handicap of having to try out new rubbers following the change in the regulations. The Women's Singles was won by Janice Lee.
 
ETTA Vice-Presidency for Graham 28.6.08
Club Chairman and General Secretary Graham Trimming's work on behalf of the Club and the Slough League for the past 35 years were further rewarded with his election as Vice-President of the ETTA at the national governing body's AGM.
 
Women's British League 21-22.6.08
Another fantastic performance from Rachel Farquhar whose 19 wins out of 20 over the season earned her the Player of the Weekend vote secured the WBL Third Division title for Cippenham. The crunch result was  Cippenham's 4-2 over Southampton West and put put us one point ahead our south coast rivals  Caroline Linz and Sue Hayes were the other members of the successful team and all three ladies provided important wins.
 
Cippenham Grand Prix 14 17.6.08
Consistency is what wins the Cippenham Grand Prix. Ricky Hardcastle is the latest winner of the six week series and he is the fourth winner in succession (and fifth overall) to do so without winning any one of the weekly events. An ever present with two second and three third place finishes saw him amass more points than rivals Steve Smith snr (father of the Club's new Events Officer) and Anthony Gardner. The six weekly winners were Steve Smith snr, Tony Andrews, Tony Stead, Steve Smith, Sue Hayes and Graham Trimming.
 
Cippenham Young Players' Summer Festival 14-15.7.08
Another bumper entry for the YPSF kept organizers Ken Phillips and Jan Chapman plus seventeen tables busy all weekend. All the main titles were shared between Wales and Essex who gained four each. Emran Hussain, Reece Tan, Lewis Williams (2), Evangeline Collier, Chloe Thomas, Taylor Williams and Estelle Purkis were the winners.
 
Annual General Meeting 28.5.08
All the officers were re-elected apart from Catherine Hayes who stood down after three years as Events Officer. Her place was taken by Steve Smith. Neil Bird and Amar Abid-Ali joined the Management Committee. The Chairman Graham Trimming reported on yet another very successful season in which the emphasis had been on gaining accreditation and training of volunteers. The Treasurer Peter Hillier also reported another very successful financial year in which a large surplus had been made.
 
Slough League Annual General Meeting 27.5.08
A poorly attended meeting had seen Cippenham members Graham Trimming and Elroy Hull re-elected as Fixtures Secretary and Inter-League Secretary/Competitions Secretary respectively. Graham also took on the roles of Chairman and Treasurer for a temporary period.
 
Slough Closed Championships 7.5.08
The Slough Closed Championships wrapped up with the Open Singles. It was won by Chalfont's Chris Haines and he beat our own Steve Smith in the final and Graham Trimming in the semi. The previous week had seen Steve and Sue Hayes capture the Open Doubles title.
 
Cippenham Closed Junior Singles Championship 1.5.08
Anthony Gardner, who beat Josh Marshall in the final, was the winner of a poorly attended Junior Singles event.
 
Cippenham Closed Singles Championship 24.4.08
Top seed Tony Stead is the new Club champion having beaten Grand Prix 13 winner Grzegorz Strojny in the final. The final was 3-0 but Grzeg had taken the only game off Tony in the preliminary round groups. Graham Trimming, the number two seed, fell to Armado Borges in the last 16 while the other semi-finalists were Steve Smith and Sue Hayes. The 27 contestants were originally split into nine groups of three. In previous weeks Tony had partnered Steve Buck to win the Open Doubles, Paul Elliot  had won the Veterans' Singles and Grzeg the Tweenies' Singles.
Cippenham Cadet and Under-13 2-Star Open Championships 13.4.08
It’s unusual for an unseeded player to lose his first match and go on to win an event but that is exactly what happened for Ayman Al-Sibassi in the Cadet Boys’ Singles. Michael Ho won the Under-13 Boys' Singles while Feifei Pei and Lucy Lou made it a clean sweep for Surrey when they won the two girls' events.
 
Slough Sports Awards 31.3.08
The Club came away with two more awards from this annual event. David Hayes became only the second Club member to win Senior Sportsperson of the Year, four years after being Junior Sportsman of the Year while the Club received the accolade of Junior Club of the Year for the fourth time (and the eighth overall award for the whole club).
 
Grand Prix 13 25.3.08
New member Grzegorz Strojny became the latest and 13th winner of the Club's Grand Prix series. Improving results over the last five weeks, including second place in the final round, saw his tally rise to 215 points, 15 ahead of Alan Farral and Eddie Mitchell who came joint second. Other newcomers, Ricky Hardcastle and Gavin Williams were fourth and fifth. Alan and Eddie won four of the weekly events between them while Tony Stead and Tony Andrews won the other two. A new record was set with 48 different participants over the six week series.
 
County Championships Senior Division 1B 15-16.3.08
Bucks senior county team, comprising of six players all from Cippenham TTC, made home advantage pay as they won Division 1B of the County Championships and secured promotion to the Premier Division. There were many good performances but none better than Steve Munson who won all 13 of his matches as Bucks won five and drew two of their seven encounters.
 
Selection for Pre-Olympics Training Venue Guide 3.3.08
Cippenham Table Tennis Centre has been included within London 2012’s Pre-Games Training Camp Guide. More than a year after submitting an application, the news has been received that our table tennis centre will be offered to teams as a pre-Olympics training venue in the run up to the 2012 Games. This is great news for the Club and establishes Cippenham as one of the top table tennis facilities in the country.
 
Cippenham Veterans' 2-Star Open Championships 2.3.08
Abdul Wuraola, number two ranked veteran in England behind Alan Cooke (!), showed his class as he romped home in the Men's Singles without dropping a game. First time visitor Julie Thorn won the counterpart women's event. Best local - Paul Elliot made it all the way to the quarter-final and included wins over fifth seed Andy Misseldine and eighth seed Dave Crowley. 64 players entered, another good result!
 
Cippenham Women's British League 1st Weekend 1-2.3.08
A perfect 10 for Rachel Farquhar who did not drop a game never mind a set all weekend spearheaded Cippenham to second place in Division 3 after the first weekend. Rachel was backed up by Caroline Linz and Sue Hayes as Cippenham gained nine points out of a possible ten.
 
British League 4th Weekend 16-17.2.08
A most satisfactory weekend for the Club's teams in the final session of the British League. The first team took five points to stave off any relegation threat and eventually finished fifth in Division 1 South. In their final match they thrashed long term leaders Brighton 7-1 to deny their opponents the title. The third team also took five points to rise to seventh place in Division 3 South and while the second team could not lift themselves off the foot of Division 1 South and Midlands although they did enjoy a 5-3 win over Urban Progress,
 
Grand Prix 12 12.2.08
Paul Chandler, one of the most frequent players in the Grand Prix series, won GP12. Paul finished in the placings in each of the six weekly events and achieved second place twice. Jack McCandless won two of the three events he entered and finished second while Dave Bradbury only entered two but won one of those to finish in third place. The other weekly winners were Tony Andrews, Ian Baker and Alan Farral.
 
Cippenham Group to Group 2-Star Open Championship 10.2.08
A small entry of 33 but an enjoyable days' play with groups of four players going into further groups of four for the second stage. Darren Pumford was the eventual winner with Phil Clarkson, who reached the semi-final, being the most successful local.
 
Junior British League 2nd Weekend 9-10.2.08
Both Cippenham teams doubled their points tally from the first half to stay in their respective places in the league tables - runners-up in Division 2A for the boys, and fourth in Division 1 for the girls.
 
Veterans' British League 2nd Weekend 26-27.1.08
An improved showing that included a 5-1 win over South Essex was, nevertheless, not enough for Cippenham to climb off bottom spot in Division 1A. The re-alignment of divisions last year did Cippenham no favours and Division 2 beckons for next season.
 
European Cadet Top 10 25-27.1.08
Gavin Evans gained a bronze medal at the European cadet Top 10 tournament in Sheffield. The top seed won six and lost three matches to confirm him as one of the best players of his age in Europe.
 
Clubmark accreditation 21.1.08
Cippenham Table Tennis Club has achieved Sport England Clubmark status and is an accredited ETTA Excellence PremierClub. This is the highest level attainable and confirms the Club as being in the elite of sports clubs nationwide. There are several advantages pertaining to this: the Club is now eligible to bid for more funding streams, partners such as Slough Council are permitted to refer potential members to us and it confirms our status as a properly constituted sports club operating in a safe environment. The Club has been striving for this accreditation for several months now and owes a debt of gratitude to those responsible for making it happen.
 
Training courses 20.1.08
About a dozen Club members and some also from other clubs spent the day being trained on first aid and child protection. Whilst these courses are a necessary part of the curriculum for coach education and therefore many of the attendees were from the Club's coaching staff, other members of the Club's management took advantage to brush up their knowledge on these very important topics.
 
Queensmere exhibition 19.1.08
Cippenham TTC set up a table in Slough's premier shopping centre and star players wowed passers-by with their skill at the sport. Interested people, particularly young children, took up the opportunity to try out the sport and hundreds of leaflets were distributed. Thanks to all those who came and lent a hand putting on a polished display that will have given many members of the public a new insight into our exciting sport.
 
Cippenham Young Players' New Year Festival 12-13.1.08
Another bumper entry of 320 players, 17 tables and two action packed days. That's the way Festivals are at Cippenham under the watchful eyes of Ken Phillips and Jan Chapman. This one proved to be another Welsh takeaway with brother and sister Patrick and Chloe Thomas taking the U18 titles. Chloe also won the U14GS. There were titles also for Guy Ben-Aroya and Rachael Anslow in the U16s, Jared Patel in both U14 and U12BS and Annabelle Gibson in U12GS.
 
British League 3rd Weekend 6.1.08
Not much joy for the Club's three teams in this short one-day session. The first team got the weekend off to a good start by beating Fusion 5-3 but that was the sum total of all points mustered. They lie sixth in an extremely close Div 1 South while the second team are seventh in Div 1 South and Midlands. The third team languish in eighth spot in Division 3 South.
 
Grand Prix 11 10.12.07
Junior players dominated the latest Grand Prix. Second place for David Akehurst in the final event secured him the overall title, relegating previous leader Anthony Gardner into second place. New member Dave Bradbury came in third and he was one of six different weekly winners over the period. The others were Alex Polding, Seb Nimier, Tim Kiteley, Steve Smith and Tom Wald.
 
British League 2nd Weekend 8-9.12.07
The first team, this time at full strength, had a much better time gaining five points and remaining unbeaten over the weekend in Division 1 South. Included in this was a draw to claim the first points that Brighton had dropped this season and a win over then second-placed DML Woolwell. Martin Adams again starred with 6 wins from 8 and was well supported by the other players. The second and third teams did not fare so well, gaining only three points between them.
Southern Region Trials 1-2.12.07
Eddie Mitchell continued his list of successes over the past few weeks by winning the U15 section of the regional trials. Second was Jonathan Evans.
 
Cippenham Junior 2-Star Open Championships 18.11.07
Another good entry of 93 culminated in more reward for Club members. The boys' final was contested between two Cippenham Junior British League team-mates. Local boy Eddie Mitchell came from behind to defeat Ruihao Zhang 3-2. The girls' event was won by Charleigh Kirby of Middlesex.
 
Buckinghamshire Junior Closed Championships 17.11.07
There were more titles for Cippenham players at the Bucks Junior Closed. Eddie Mitchell won three of these - the Junior Boys' Singles, Cadet Boys' Singles and the Junior Doubles with Alex Polding. Angela Oetiker made it a clean sweep for Cippenham in the U18 events with the Junior Girls' Singles, beating Steph Mitchell in the final.
 
Grand Prix 11 30.10.07
Graham Trimming won the tenth Grand Prix series with a record number of points, 420. The final match saw him beat rival Steve Smith 12-10 in the fifth to secure his first title. Steve was second overall and Anthony Gardner, a winner over Gerald Finesilver on the night, came through to bag third spot.
 
Veterans' British League 1st Weekend 27-28.10.07
The Cippenham men's team found themselves out of their depth in the restructured Veterans' British League first weekend. After an excellent record last year in which they survived in Division 2, the team found themselves in one of two equal First Divisions and lost every match.
 
Cippenham Team 2-Star Open Championship 21.10.07
A maximum entry of 24 teams was achieved for the second running of the unique Team Open and the level of competition remained high throughout the day. In the end third seeds Dan and Dave, the Gloucestershire duo of Dave Harvey and Dan Kolesnik, took home the title after a pulsating final match against the unseeded youngsters, Zal Zilesnick and Reeve Tan, of Barnet. Top seeds Brighton (Jack Boult, Evan Sharp) beat second seeds The Baldies (Yasir Mauthoor, Fred Dove) in the third-fourth place play-off. All teams finished with a ranking with Cippenham members Roger Hookey and Mike Rhodes, playing as Solent Sharks, finishing fifth.
 
Junior British League 1st Weekend 13-14.10.07
The Club is operating only one boys' and one girls' team this season. The boys lie second in Division 2A but are only one point ahead of the fourth placed team in a congested mid-table while the girls lie fourth in Division 1. Best performance of the weekend came from new signing Ruihao Zhang who won eight of his ten matches.
 
Annual Awards Evening 2.10.07
The Club presented its annual awards at the Anniversary Party. The coveted Outstanding Achievement Award went to Malcolm Makarian, an ever willing helper at weekend events and at weekend practice sessions. The Senior Player of the Year was Georgia Veneer. Four months after extensive knee surgery Georgia won a bronze medal at the European Veterans' Championships, while Rachel Farquhar's reward for a fine season in which she gained national prominence was the Junior Player of the Year award. Sue Hayes and Jan Chapman were the surprised recipients of the ETTA Merit Award for more than ten years' administrative service to the sport and even more surprised was Graham Trimming who was appointed the first Life Member of the Club.
 
Cippenham Senior 2-Star Open 23.9.07
Patrick Thomas took home another Cippenham trophy to his home in Wales. The 15 year old became the youngest ever winner of the Senior Open and added this title to the Double Group that he won last season and a host of junior awards. A decent entry of over 70 players enjoyed the opening event of the Club's new season.
 
Grand Prix 9 18.9.07
Steve Smith was declared the winner of the biggest and best Grand Prix yet - an event in which 42 different players took part over the six weeks. Graham Trimming and Paul Baker will be required to play off for second and third positions.
 
ETTA Volunteer and Coach Awards 15.9.07
Cippenham picked up an unprecedented four awards at this prestigious ceremony. In fantastic recognition of the Club's contribution to the national table tennis scene the four awards went to Graham Trimming (PremierClub Volunteer of the Year), Stephanie Mitchell (Young Volunteer of the Year), Jacquie Lovell (Volunteer Coordinator of the Year) and Jan Chapman (Female Coach of the Year). Congratulations to all!
 
British League 1st Weekend 8-9.9.07
All three Cippenham teams made disappointing starts to the new British League season, winning only four points between them. The highlights of the weekend were the second team's 6-2 win over Oxford, Martin Adams' new flawless display with seven out of eight at the head of the first team, including a win over Marco Essomba, David Hayes' flattening of former England international David Barr, Paul Elliott's brace to win a draw for the third team against OLOP IMPACT II and Steve Smith's two on debut against Ellenborough II.

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