Major Changes to New Zealand Championships Teams Events

The elimination of doubles matches, the limiting of grades to six teams, the introduction of grading matches to precede the round-robins, and the addition of a final between the top two teams in all grades after the round-robin radically changed the face of the teams section of the New Zealand Championships.

The changes resulted from a 1993 Annual General Meeting decision and appeared to receive general acceptance from players and team managers.

The grading matches had the potential to arouse the most controversy – they required the lowest seeded team in each grade to play the highest seeded team in the grade below and also the second lowest to play the second highest, thus giving another team at least an outside chance to win entry to a higher grade. If either or both of the lower-graded teams won their grading match they would take the place in the higher grade of the team they beat while the losing team would be demoted. The seedings and provisional positions were not declared publicly, with the published draw showing “winner of grading match between Team X and Team Y” in the higher grade and the loser of the same match in the draw for the lower grade.

The teams were initially graded and seeded on the known strength of the declared players.

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Oceania Championships: Everyone a Winner, except the Accommodation

Peter Jackson topped New Zealand’s performances at this event, held in Tahiti in May. He reached the men’s singles final, losing to Paul Langley, and attained an Oceania ranking of No 2.

Every player in the 19-strong team returned with at least one medal, with the younger age-groups (Under 17 and Under 15) finding gold and silver more attainable given the limited participation of Australian players in these age-groups, for which there were no team events. Clara So and Jason Ng both won two gold medals.

A serious accommodation problem was resolved by team management’s prompt action after the original accommodation was discovered to amount to no more than mattresses spread out under a grandstand at a sports ground. Alternative accommodation was arranged but the incident provoked an unfortunate burst of media publicity following a written complaint by one of the team officials. The matter was resolved once both sides had been made aware of the full details, in particular the frustrating difficulty getting confirmation from Tahitian officials that their offer to arrange accommodation was in hand and that the arrangements were adequate.

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Obituary: Two Former NZ Representatives die in their 30’s

The tragic early death of first, Malcolm Temperley, and less than three weeks later, Graham Lassen cast a gloom over the early months of the year.

Following an impressive career as a junior, Graham Lassen made a dramatic come-back in the late 1970s after a total lay-off. He represented New Zealand for several years and won the NZ Singles title in 1979 and 1980. He moved off-shore and into a variety of occupations before settling in Canberra, where he died of cancer on 13 April at the age of 39.

Malcolm Temperley was at the forefront of his age-group as a junior and remained a top player through to the late 1980s. He attained a peak Commonwealth ranking of 13 in 1985 and had for several years represented NZ as this country’s undisputed third-best male player behind Barry Griffiths and Peter Jackson. He moved into coaching, exhibition play and administration. He died of a brain tumour on 27 March at the age of 33.

Other table tennis administrators and players to pass away in the course of the year included Norm Ballinger, Thelma May, Roy Lea and Laurence Wilson.

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Coaching Restructure

On the initiative of Executive Director Merv Allardyce, and after wide consultation and discussion, a regional coaching structure was set up requiring a Regional Coach and a Regional Coaching Co-ordinator to be appointed for each of three regions (Northern, Central and Southern), overseen by the NZ Director of Coaching. Barry Butler was appointed to the latter position, vacant since the resignation of Peter Hirst, and the other six positions were filled following a call for applications.

A national coaching strategy was formulated by the NZ Coaching Committee, comprising the Director of Coaching, the three Area Coaching Co-ordinators, the Convener of the National Selection Panel and Table Tennis’s KiwiSport representative. Area coaching strategy, within the declared national framework, was in the hands of each Area Co-ordinator.

Seventeen area training camps catering for 210 players at various stages of development were held throughout the year. In addition, two early season national camps were held – one combining seniors and juniors, the other exclusively for juniors.

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Exposure of Table Tennis Continues in Schools

As an extension of a campaign begun in 1992, there was a major drive to educate more coaches to work in clubs and schools. Teachers and tertiary students were the primary targets of the campaign which was extraordinarily successful. 320 students underwent a basic coaching course and a similar level of attainment was reached by 402 coaches in clubs and schools throughout the country. A total of 3,300 children were given table tennis tuition at school at some stage throughout the year.

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Commonwealth Championships

This event is normally scheduled just before the World Championships but had been postponed from 1993 and held early this year in Hyderabad, India. The team of Karl Entwistle, Daniel Hempstead, Alan Shewan, Tracey Epps and Melanie Low struggled at this level and both the men’s and women’s teams failed to win a match. Alan Shewan was the best performer overall, winning five of his 14 singles in the teams events and going on in the individual events to beat Sen Yew Fai (Singapore) three straight and then narrowly lose to Chan Chi Ming (Hong Kong) 12-21, 21-19, 19-21, 19-21.

Martin Duffy and Richard Lee managed and coached the team.

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Large NZ Contingent at World Veterans Championships

With the World Veterans Championships held in Melbourne this year, a record number of New Zealanders took the rare opportunity to make only a short hop across the Tasman to participate.

Entry is open to anyone over the age of 40 at these championships, making it an even larger event than the World Championships where entry is more rigidly controlled by national associations. The total entry was 1,809 including sixty from New Zealand – one of whom was the tournament’s oldest competitor, 87 year old Errol Cheal of Auckland.

Some excellent New Zealand performances were recorded. Yvonne Fogarty reached the Over 40 Women’s quarter-finals while Isabel Cleland reached the same level in the Over 70 Women’s singles. Barbara Jackson reached the round of 16 in the Over 60 Women’s Singles. New Zealand’s proudest moment came when former TTNZ Chairman Alf Harding (pictured) stood on the dais to receive a bronze medal for reaching the semi-final in the Over 80 Men’s Doubles. He declared it to be the highlight of his table tennis career, which spanned more than six decades.

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Change of Prize for National Lottery

After several years of dwindling profits, the decision was taken to dispense with the long-standing prize of a car and replace it with three attractive travel packages heading a total list of 53 prizes. Overall profits increased as a result and, as part of a complex arrangement, some associations took advantage of an opportunity to divert part of the profit to a travel fund which reduced the costs their players faced in attending major overseas tournaments.

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Under 15 Boys Perform Best at Australian Junior Championships

Of the four NZ teams invited to participate in the Australian Junior Championships, the best performances were recorded by the Under 15 boys. Kirk George and Stephen Hirst won the gold medal in the Boys’ Doubles with their two team-mates Paul Innes and Jason Ng winning bronze in the same event. As a team they finished third behind Queensland and Victoria after losing to both by the narrow margin of 4-5. Kirk George was the stand-out player overall, winning 90% of his singles matches in the teams events and in the individuals collecting two more medals, both bronze, in the Under 15 Boys’ Singles and the Under 15 Mixed Doubles with Tracey McLauchlan.

The Under 17 Boys’ team finished 4th and the Girls’ teams in both age-groups finished 5th.

The championships were held in Geelong, Victoria in early July and the full teams were: (Under 17 boys) Brendon Adam, Chris Herlihy, Ben Lindstrom, Jan Ng; (Under 17 girls) Belinda Beazer, Melissa Beazer, Tracey Harris, Laura-Lee Smith; (Under 15 boys) Kirk George, Stephen Hirst, Paul Innes; Jason Ng; (Under 15 girls) Anna Danby, Catherine Danby, Tracey McLauchlan, Clara So. The officials were Greg Adam, Martin Duffy, Ron Garrett and Richard Lee, with support from three parents who also travelled with the team.

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Asian Senior Championships

New Zealand was invited to this event in Tianjin, China in September. Only a women’s team was selected and they faced ferocious opposition, doing well to record one win, against Sri Lanka 3-2.

Debbie Garrett, Sabine Koestel and Raewyn Young were the playing team members, with Martin Duffy the Manager, Coach and Non-playing Captain.

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John Lelliott Wins Gold in Australian Over 60 Singles; Over 40 Women’s Team Does Well

One of John Lelliott’s best wins in a long veterans career took place at the Australian Veterans Championships in Perth in October. He was drawn to meet the top seed (Bill Bates of Victoria) in the quarter-final of the Over 60 Men’s Singles and, in a major upset, beat him 21-18, 15-21, 21-5. He went on to win both the semi-final and final to take the gold medal. He complemented this with a bronze medal in the Over 60 Men’s Doubles partnered by Victorian Tom Sal.

John’s team-mates in the Over 50 Men’s team were Eddie Millard and Eddie Moore and the team finished 7th out of ten. In the women’s section the Over 40 team of Lynley Barker, Val Beaver and Averil Roberts performed well to beat New South Wales, Queensland, Western Australia and Northern Territory and finish third. Lynley Barker reached the quarter-finals in both the singles and doubles.

Kevin Fogarty and Janice Stead also attended this event, both playing in President’s teams in their respective age-groups – Over 40 and Over 50.

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Association Award to Wanganui

For outstanding achievement in promotional and publicity work, Wanganui Association was the recipient of an Association Award.

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Drug Testing Starts

An Act of Parliament established the Sports Drug Agency to implement a drug testing regime. As an Olympic sport Table Tennis was required to adopt a drug policy, a framework to allow random testing to take place and disciplinary and appeal procedures to follow in the event of any positive test result. Details had to be communicated to top players of all age-groups, including the names of banned drugs.

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NZ Contributes to Australian Table Tennis Magazine

A glossy magazine published quarterly by Table Tennis Australia was promoted for sale in New Zealand after NZTTA was invited to contribute four pages of New Zealand news in each issue of the publication. A news-sheet containing more local news was inserted into each copy mailed to the New Zealand subscribers.

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