Dundee & District Table Tennis Association

“Aces on the climb”

Truants closed out their title rivals with a comprehensive victory over Telecoms and regained their Division One title. As usual, it was much harder work than the score suggests. Gillian Edwards had lost to Ian Farquhar in game 4, before Elaine Forbes beat The Doc in five sets in the 5th and Derek Bisset had a struggle with Iain Meldrum to win in 4 in the 6^th game at a stage pivotal to the outcome.  Chris Boler’s rare outing galvanised Aces against Missiles, with Jim Dyson being unbeaten.  Aidan Flegg was Missiles’ best player in a high quality league match winning two of his three games.  Defenders’ Scott Thomson lost 10-12 in the deciding set against Andy Ferguson in a match subsequently dominated by Star.  Ken Head teamed up with Scott in the doubles to prevent the whitewash.

“Advantage New Kids”

Division Two title contenders New Kids returned from BT House with a good score which put them in charge in the run-in.  However, Tass contributed to a fabulous match which contained six five-setters.  Graeme Elrick and Ian Hutcheson got Tass’ points, while Thomas Bowden and Peter Bladen remained unscathed.  Rollercoasters left it too late to get into the game against Telstars.  By the time Joe Bell and Tony Cook got on the scoresheet, the hosts already had the finishing line in sight.  David Monteith won his three in a key match for the title hopefuls.  Defibs may be too far behind the two top teams, but they clocked up a useful score at the expense of Tigers just in case.  James Shaw was forced to play with one of his team-mates’ bats, but adjusted well to win his games.  Kenny Mclaren got Tigers’ consolation early on.  Two narrow wins by David Fletcher and the doubles got Rockets some useful points off Chieftains.  Player of the match was Derek Johnston, however, who acted as ‘super-sub’.  Three five-set wins by Prefects were not enough to beat all-ladies Comets, for whom Jill Milne had a fine match.  Ken Falconer got most plaudits for the hosts.

1. New Kids           16      13      1        2        106:54

2. Telstars             15      12      1        2        104:46

3. Defibs               15      12      0        3        98:52

“Barons in touching distance”

Andy Hughes deputised for Barons in their chase of Division Three leaders Kingsway.  Kenneth Kerr got a good win for Lairds mid-way through the match, but Barons were rarely troubled.  Kingsway’s lead is now down to one point, and a good score against fellow firies Blackness helped them to hang on to top spot. The opener between Derek Thomson (who went on to win two for Blackness) and Willie Cooper was a cracker, with Willie taking the first two sets 13-11 and 18-16, before being forced into a decider. Sputniks recovered from a 2-0 deficit against Allrounders to run out winners.  Cheryl Walls and Rab Kindlen had given the Dundee College trio the lead, but three wins by David Hunter and a nail-biter by Michael Thomson turned the match on its head.

1. Kingsway          16      15      1        0        131:29

2. Barons              16      14      0        2        130:29

3. Attackers           15      11      2        2        112:38

In Division Four, Swots celebrated a rare victory over stuttering Baldragon.  Veteran Bill Sutherland had too much experience to see off the keen youngsters, for whom Terry Gray and Kenny Hare got two wins each. That result helped Dukes who have an eye on the runners-up spot at least.  In addition, they also got full points against battling Viscounts for whom Ruaridh Burns and Filip Jovanovic came close to get points for the TT novices. 

In the 1980s (writes Graham Wood, Secretary, Coaching & Development Group), there were 7 divisions each of 12 teams in the Dundee & District Table Tennis Association league. Today, in February 2010, there are 35 teams playing in 4 divisions. Despite the reduction of active players in the league within that period, however, there have been a number of positive developments in more recent times.

Not least among these, and following a lot of hard work over 8 years by many organisations and individuals (including Sandy Elrick and Stewart Clark), was the opening in 2006 of a fully re-furbished multi-sport facility at Ward Road Gym in the centre of Dundee. With regard to table tennis, this facility is fully utilised every week on Monday and Friday evenings for coaching of beginner, intermediate, and elite groups, on Tuesday evenings for league and cup matches, and on some weekends through the season for various tournament events.

In the same season as the above facility opened, the numbers playing table tennis in the Dundee area reached an all-time low: only 28 teams in 3 divisions. Something more had to be done to encourage especially youngsters to take up the game and to continue playing into adulthood. D&DTTA’s executive committee were fortunate to have someone with a get-up-and-get-on-with-it approach to start to address this issue. Christine Halliday (now deceased), and with the help of her husband Brian, threw herself into establishing a ‘beginners’ division participating in the local league and to getting proper coaching sessions set up at Ward Road gym. Soon, another husband and wife team – Juliet and Derek Johnston – also added to the effort.

Individual clubs within the D&DTTA umbrella also provide coaching and practise sessions. Most notable are the Plebeians Club at Broughty Ferry and the table tennis club at Memorial Hall in St Andrews.

The current impetus to ensure the survival and further development of table tennis within the Dundee & District area is being driven by Paul Rawlings-Jackson, coaching convener since 2008/2009. He highlighted three main areas to be addressed within 5 years:

1. qualified coach education; 2. schools coaching programmes; and 3. club coaching.

Within only two seasons, the first coaching courses under the new unified UK Coaching Certificate scheme have been organised (delivered on 14 February and 14 March 2010 in Dundee at Ward Road Gym); club coaching to help improve the performance of lower ranked players/teams by providing advice on equipment and styles of play is being undertaken by Jim Brown; and (in conjunction with the Active Schools Programme) 26 primary and 9 secondary schools within Dundee have had table tennis induction and coaching courses delivered.

This is not a short-term fix: it is going to require a lot of continuing work to keep it going. The programme of coaching and development of table tennis in Dundee is reaping benefits for new and continuing players, young and old, and for the Dundee & District Table Tennis Association’s longer term future.

The vast bulk of the work is done on a voluntary basis by unpaid people in their own time. Many have contributed and supported, either financially or with time and personal input, to the steady improvement outlined above. Table Tennis Scotland, Dundee City Council, D&DTTA Executive Committee (chair Ian Mclagan, vice David Sim), SportDundee, Active Schools Co-ordinators, Activity Leaders (Dundee College), Jim Brown, Paul McCabe, Andrew Pettican, Cheryl Walls, Tees Sport, Ifor Williams Trailers, plus the other un-named individuals who week in week out continue to give of their time largely without any recognition.