Bury St Edmunds

I started the last newsletter with a plea for more help in running the Club. Since then we have had Tim Jolly and Neil Talbot go on a Coaches level 2 course and they are now completing their final training. Ian Shilling also went on an Introduction to Coaching course. We also have one other member waiting to go on a level 2 course. These additions to the coaching staff are very welcome and have helped spread the workload. I say “workload” but I think they will agree that the coaches get as much out of it as the students.
Michael Hatcher has taken over running the Club website and it is full of useful information, well done Mike. The website address is: www.bsettc.co.uk
We also welcomed onto the committee Neil Talbot, Tim Jolly, Janet Hobley and Mike Ross. Thanks also to the team secretaries who organize the various league teams.
I must not forget John Waters and Maurice Fearn who have taken on the bulk of the jobs since the Club started.

More people are getting involved but we still need to find volunteers to take on some of the other jobs, I will shortly be making a list of the various jobs, who does them now, and how long they take.

CLUB SHIRTS

The committee decided that the Club needed an identity and that a specially designed Club shirt would help advertise the Club. The shirt is red with a navy trim with an embroidered Club badge. A good number of players have already bought a shirt and it looks very impressive when all the players in the team are wearing the same shirts. I would encourage all other players and indeed those who don't play in a league team to buy a shirt. The cost is £15 a shirt and any orders should be made to Peter Fordham.

SENIOR LEAGUE TEAMS

Will all team captains make sure they collect match fees from their players and pay them promptly to the Treasurer John Waters.
In the first division Vikings are laying second but it is very close. Crusaders are 7th but with a game in hand could move up 3 places.
In the second division Romans and Saxons are 3rd equal with identical records but with a game in hand on the 2nd team one of them could move into a promotion place.
The 3rd division sees Commandos sitting at the top whilst Conquerors and Cavaliers are fighting for bottom place. But a couple of good results could shoot them up the league.

SUFFOLK & CAMBS BORDER JUNIOR LEAGUE

This League is organized and run by the Club at Culford with teams coming from different clubs in the area. After 2 matches this season we are leading both divisions with Culford Cougars (James Swanston, Patrick Moran) top of division 1. Bury Kestrels (Rosanna & Oliver Shilling) are top of the second division. Our other teams are Bury Sparrowhawks (Ben Showell, Bill Kilner), Bury Falcons (Alex Printie, Kieran Leeks, Martin West), Culford Cubs (Tom Walker, Kenny Chan, Martin Fong). Results, league tables etc. can be seen on our website www.bsettc.co.uk.

NATIONAL JUNIOR LEAGUE

This is a team of local juniors, Josh Taylor from Gazeley, Aaron Self from Rougham and Ed Spencer from our club.
In the first round of matches at Braintree they did particularly well to win 3 of their 4 matches. They beat Stowmarket 4-2, Kings Lynn 6-0, and Chelmsford 6-0 but unfortunately went down 5-1 to a strong Norwich team.

WESTLEY SCHOOL

We run after school clubs at Westley on Tuesdays and Friday afternoons. Each course runs for 5 weeks and these are very successful with an average of about 20 at each session. Most of them are beginners and though we cannot do much intensive coaching in that short time we do get them interested in table tennis and teach them the basic rules and strokes. Our work is now starting to pay off as we now have some pupils coming through to our sessions at Culford and the County.
It is a pity Suffolk no longer has a Schools Table Tennis Association because this is where all these potential players got good experience at their tournaments.
We have again been successful in getting a Lottery awards for all grant which enabled us to buy 4 new tables which we have located at Westley School.
Thanks to Maurice Fearn and John Horner who along with me have made this venture successful.

STANTON SCHOOL

Just a mention of John Coxen, who plays for Culford Conquerors, who has started up an after school club at Stanton and along with Ian Shilling is running a nice little club. They need tables so if anyone knows of any good second hand tables please speak to John.

COUNTY UPPER SCHOOL - Junior coaching

It was felt that it was not possible, at the Westley and Culford Junior Sessions, to give any intensive coaching. So we decided to start a new session at the County on Fridays between 6.00pm and 7.00pm where we invited juniors who had the right attitude and ability to progress. The players invited came from the clubs at Westley, Culford and Rougham. We are restricting the numbers to about 10 and though this project has only been going for 3 weeks we can already see the improvement in play. Hopefully we can produce some good juniors who can compete at County level and above.

COUNTY UPPER SCHOOL - Adult practice

This is a very popular session with up to about 15 at each session with a good mix of standards. Thanks to those who help to get out and put away the tables.

CULFORD SCHOOL - Junior Coaching

This is also proving popular, though the numbers did drop they have picked up again with several Culford pupils now attending.

COUNTY & LEAGUE TOURNAMENTS

Just a reminder that the County Junior Tournament will be held at Culford on Saturday 24th January and I will let those interested have an entry form shortly. Closing date is 3rd January.
The Bury League tournament is also at Culford on Sunday 21st March and all those who are registered with the league are eligible to enter. An entry form is inside the League handbook; if you haven't got one please ask a teammate for a copy. Closing date is 14th February.

CLUB TOURNAMENT

Thanks to Maurice for organising last years tournament which was enjoyed by all those who took part. Unfortunately we ran out of time to run all the events so for the coming year we have booked the hall at Culford for a longer period. This year's tournament is on Sunday 29th February and Maurice will be sending out details in due course.
The results from last year were:-

ETTA CONFERENCE AT LILLESHALL

Maurice and I went to this teaching and training conference where we were brought up to date with the latest coaching techniques and what generally is going on in the table tennis world. It is very useful to hear how other clubs operate and we all seem to have the same sort of problems mainly lack of volunteers, difficulty with premises and lack of money. Table Tennis is suffering as far as getting money from Sport England. To get serious funding you have to have players in the top twenty or so in the world. In some sports like Rugby and Cricket this is relatively easy as there are only a few countries that play these sports. In Table Tennis there are over a 100
Countries entered for next years Olympics and with China producing dozens of world class players it is very difficult for England to get a player ranked that high.
The “star” of the Conference was Stellan Bengston the former World Champion from Sweden. He gave a very informative talk on his table tennis life and how the sport is run in Sweden. He is now a top class coach and he took A practical session where he showed us the importance of multi ball training.

Finally have a good season, enjoy playing Table Tennis. If you have any ideas or think of anything we can change please let the committee know or better still volunteer to help sort it.

Peter Fordham
Chairman