The curtain came down on another season at Cippenham Table Tennis Club at the weekend
with the eleventh annual Cippenham Young Players’ Summer Festival. This two-day bonanza,
a 1-star open tournament in four age groups, continues to be the most eagerly awaited
in the calendar and once again the total entry was around the 300 mark. Referee Ken
Phillips, his assistant Jan Chapman, and the many other volunteers who turned up
to help were kept busy managing the seventeen tables over the entire weekend.
Reading’s Daniel Moses emerged as the star of the boys’ events, winning both competitions
on Sunday, while Evangeline Collier and Sally Hoang shared the top honours in the
girls.
The final match of a long weekend, the final of the Under-18 Boys’ Singles, turned
out to be one of the most exciting. Moses had to come back from two games to one
down and survive match point in the fifth to earn his double. His opponent on this
occasion was Emre Ibotoglu. While both players attacked hard, it was Ibotoglu who
had the more fearsome attack with Moses relying more on soaking up the pressure utilizing
a more defensive style and his strong counter-blocking backhand won many points.
While Moses, the second seed, was a more expected finalist, Ibotoglu, actually seeded
fourth, failed to win his opening group. That position went to Jared Parsons who
took his opportunity to make it right through to the semi-final where he fell to
Moses. Ibotoglu, however, recovered from that reverse to set about a run that took
him past third seed Tony Ziqiri in the semi-final.
Earlier in the day, Moses had also prevailed in the Under-16 Boys’ Singles. In this
event he was in the same half of the draw as Ibotoglu and their meeting in the semi-final
ended in the same result. It was another Reading youngster, Liam McTiernan, a member
of the host Cippenham club, who prospered in the top half of the draw. The sixth
seed made it all the way through to the final after defeating Josh Jenkins in his
semi-final. However, it was Moses that won the battle of Reading three-straight in
the final.
Liam, overall, had a good weekend. On Saturday, in the Under-14 Boys’ Singles, he
made it to another final and led Ashley Facey-Thompson 2-1 before losing at deuce
in the fifth game. Television viewers may recognize Facey-Thompson, a member of the
Great Britain paralympic squad, as one of a duo of Greenhouse players who took part
in a celebrity challenge televised live from the Royal Albert Hall recently. The
sixth seed surpassed himself beating fourth seed Rafi Conn-Kowlessar in the quarters
and then top seed Alois Clare in the semi.
It was Jack Bennett who scooped the other boys’ prize, the Under-12 title, on Saturday.
He beat Daniel McTiernan, younger brother of Liam, in the semi-final and then Marcus
Giles in the final. The other semi-finalist was Daniel Pound.
Evangeline Collier and Sally Hoang shared Sunday’s main prizes in the girls’ events
beating each other in the two finals. In the early under-16 event it was Hoang who
prevailed 3-1 while later Collier gained her revenge in the under-18 final, albeit
the result was closer and not decided until 11-8 in the fifth. Feifei Pei was a semi-finalist
in both events, while the other beaten semi-finalists were Majada Yasmin in the under-18’s
and Chantelle Wilson in the under-16’s. On Saturday, Lucy Lou was the winner in the
Under-14’s, over Nicole Hall, and Chrissie Slot in the Under-12’s, over Sasha Denby.
Unusually, for a junior age tournament at Cippenham, none of the winners’ award made
it down the M4 into Wales, although Hall and Denby did take back runners-up awards.
