North Cornwall Table Tennis League

THE North Cornwall Table Tennis League held it’s annual Championships recently over two nights at Budehaven and this year there were a record number of entries — 89 participants in the eight events.

Surprise results were few and far between but the real nail-biter was the Restricted Singles Final.

Keiron Chatterjea (Crackington), having beaten top seed Ian Osborne in his semi-final, had to come back from 8-10 down in the fifth game to beat Mike Kinger (North Hill) 12-10 — they don’t come much closer than that!

Full results were:

Open Singles — Winner: Shirley Luckhurst; Runner Up: Pete Freeburn

Ladies’ Singles — Winner: Shirley Luckhurst; Runner Up: Helen Murgatroyd

Open Doubles — Winners: Helen Murgatroyd, Owen Salisbury; Runners Up: Ross Wilmshurst, Mike Kinger

Mixed Doubles — Winners: Helen Murgatroyd, Dave Salisbury; Runners Up: Jill Knightley, Pete Freeburn

Junior Singles — Winner: Owen Salisbury; Runner Up: Fraser Salisbury

Super Veterans Singles — Winner: Pete Freeburn; Runner Up: Jim Rickwood

Restricted Singles — Winner: Keiron Chatterjea; Runner Up: Mike Kinger

Handicap Singles — Winner: Pete Freeburn; Runner Up: Alan Quilter

In a thrilling finish to the League, Blisland needed to beat bottom club Ashwater in their final match 10-0 to claim the Division 1 title. This proved just beyond them as Ashwater managed to win two sets which meant that Budehaven A retained their League title by a very narrow margin.

In the cup finals, Blisland found some consolation for missing out on the League title by beating North Hill A in the Division 1 cup final. All looked lost at 3-4 down but then Blisland’s Hungarian import, Akos Putz, put in a stunning display to beat North Hill’s Martin Hynes to level the score leaving captain Jim Rickwood to see out a seemingly unlikely 5-4 victory.

Budehaven C secured yet another two victories in the cups. The Division 3 cup final saw them beat Bridgerule as expected, but a tremendous fight by Bridgerule meant that it was only decided in the final set. By contrast, Budehaven C’s Handicap cup final against Torridge turned out to be rather one-sided.

Pete Freeburn got Torridge off to a good start by winning the opening set but the Budehaven youngsters, with significant handicap advantages, were able to take chances by attacking at every opportunity and the plan paid off. Fraser Salisbury was unbeaten on the night and Adam Osborne was simply unstoppable in the 5-1 win.