Sydney Olympics

Three Table Tennis players (Li Chunli, Karen Li and Peter Jackson) were selected in the New Zealand Olympic Games team to compete in Sydney, accompanied by manager/coach Murray Finch. New Zealander Michael McAvinue was independently invited to officiate as an international umpire.

Chunli won her singles group but had the misfortune to draw World Champion Wang Nan (China) in the first round (round of 32) of the main draw. She lost 7-21, 15-21, 9-21. Karen Li had one win in group play while Peter Jackson was winless but ran Baboor (India) very close in all three games. Chunli and Karen Li beat a United States pair in the first round of the Women’s Doubles and then lost to a pair from Germany.

Team manager Murray Finch kept a detailed diary of the entire Olympic experience and it was published in condensed form in Table Tennis Info magazine and on the TTNZ website. It gave a fascinating insight into the logistics of the Games, the excitement of the table tennis events, and life in the Olympic Village - interacting with other members of the NZ team.

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NZ Officials at the Olympics and Paralympics

New Zealander Val Scarr was one of about 55,000 support workers who volunteered for duties at both the Sydney Olympics and, two weeks later at the same venue, the Paralympics. Her task at both events was to help manage the table tennis players’ lounge overlooking the practice area. Val described it as the “experience of a life-time” – giving an insight into the more subtle areas of organization not obvious to competitors and officials.

Averil Roberts had the honour of an invitation to umpire at the Paralympics – a specialist area with different rules applying for wheelchair-bound players. She faced a hectic schedule: three sessions a day (nine hours) with an opening day of four sessions. Things got even busier when the individual events started. Averil umpired a number of semi-finals and five bronze medal matches including the Men’s Class 10 bronze medal play-off. Class 10 is for the least handicapped players and the spectacular match was one of only two being played before the large audience.

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World Teams Championships

The teams championships were held separately from the individual events due to a late change of venue. The 1999 World Championships were originally allocated to Belgrade, Yugoslavia but unrest and the threat of a major conflict in Yugoslavia resulted in the individual events being moved to Eindhoven, the Netherlands, in August, 1999; and the team events to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in February, 2000.

The New Zealand team was Andrew Hubbard, Peter Jackson, Shane Laugesen, Aaron Winborn, Li Chunli, Karen Li, Sarah Finch, Tracey McLauchlan. Murray Finch was the Manager/Coach.

While the women’s team’s final placing of 32nd (after 55th in 1997) sounds like, and is, a major improvement, they were unlucky not to have finished at least as high as 13th and earned a place in the top 24 for the next championships. In their key match against Australia Karen Li beat the top player but Li Chunli, decidedly off-colour on the day, lost both her matches.

The men finished 3rd in their group and had to play off for positions 57-72. They proceeded to beat South Africa, Portugul, Iceland and Kazakhstan to secure 57th place.

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Commonwealth Championships

The same team as for the World Team Championships (see above) competed at the Commonwealths, held in Singapore in February. Li Chunli collected three bronze medals. She combined with her sister Karen, Sarah Finch and Tracey McLauchlan to win bronze for NZ in the women’s team event; she and Karen beat a strong Australian pair to reach the women’s doubles semi-final thus earning another bronze; and Chunli put up a strong challenge against top seed Li Jia Wei (Singapore) in the singles semi-final, losing -17, 14, -17, -18, which put her on the podium yet again.

The men’s team finished 7th. NZ did particularly well in the Mixed Doubles: Peter Jackson and Chunli were quarter-finalists while Shane Laugesen/Karen Li and Andrew Hubbard/Sarah Finch both reached the last 16. Shane was the most successful male singles player, reaching the last 16 where he lost to top seed Johnny Huang (Canada) -16, -15, -18.

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Exhibition Table Tennis Returns to NZ

For the first time since 1989, New Zealand hosted a team of professional table tennis exhibitionists. Jindrich Pansky and Milan Orlowski of the Czech Republic entertained enthusiastic crowds at Whangarei, Christchurch and Invercargill with their spectacular play, humorous antics and novelty equipment. All Associations were given the option of hosting the pair but found the cost prohibitive - $US 1,500 plus meals and accommodation for the two players and their manager.

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Three More New Zealanders Attain International Umpire Status

David Jackson, Averil Roberts and John Stapleton all passed the exceedingly challenging International Umpires Examination to swell the ranks of this elite group from six to nine.

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Oceania Championships

A record contingent of 18 players plus two managers and four coaches travelled to Koumac, New Caledonia, to participate in Open, Under 20, Under 17 and Under 14 events at the Oceania Championships. While we had to settle for second place behind Australia in all the team events, eleven Gold Medals were secured in the individual events (3 to Li Chunli) and a staggering 30 other medals were won by NZ team members.

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Ron Menchi Ends Long-term Service to TTNZ

When Ron Menchi stepped down from the TTNZ Technical Committee, an unbroken term of 36 years serving the national body came to an end. He was first elected to the NZTTA Management Committee in 1965 and re-elected every year until the 1996 restructure. Since then he has served on the renamed TTNZ’s Technical Committee, advising the new governing Board on technical matters.

During his 32 years on the Management Committee he was Convenor of Selectors for 10 years and then served a 12 year term as NZTTA Chairman.

He was made a NZ Life Member in 1992.

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New Canterbury Stadium Opens

Players from throughout the country were able to check out New Zealand’s newest table tennis facility when they competed at the national championships in Christchurch. A team of volunteers led by Keith Armstrong, Eddie Moore and Ron Fleming had spent many months negotiating permits and finance and many more converting a warehouse into an international stadium, complete with cafeteria, showers, meeting rooms and a tournament control room. The playing area covers 1,300 square metres and can accommodate up to 22 tables.

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Obituaries

Alf Harding, best known for his 12 year term as NZTTA Chairman (1970-81), and for his prolific table tennis output as a professional sports journalist, died on 1 January at the age of 86 after a three year illness. His six decade involvement with table tennis ranged from setting up a modest club for teenagers in a backyard shed in 1934 (which grew into the Empire club and now owns its own large stadium in Petone), to accompanying a table tennis team from the Peoples Republic of China touring NZ as part of the famous “ping pong diplomacy” era of 1972. He chaired his local Association (Hutt Valley) for nine years and in his early years also excelled as a player. He was a Life member of his club, his Association and TTNZ.

Garry Frew (MBE) was one of NZ’s top players of the 1950s and 60s and among the most popular. He was best known for his defensive play and sudden, almost irretrievable, forehand drive. His unexpected death on 28 February at the age of only 64 devastated his home association of Northland where he had nurtured a large stable of high-achieving juniors in the 70s and 80s. Like Alf Harding, Garry was also a sports journalist and was sports editor for the Northern Advocate newspaper for 48 years. He was a talented sportsman and administrator of other codes as well and a Life Member of Northland Table Tennis, Northland Tennis and North Auckland Rugby Union. He was honoured with an MBE in 1982 for his services to sport.

Also lost to table tennis were two long-serving devotees at local level: Roy Gregory (Waitemata) and Ivan Houghton (Wellington)

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Umpires Committee Set Up

A four-person committee (Robert Dunn, Jim Jarmin, Michael McAvinue and Val Scarr) was set up to oversee and promote the training of umpires, to standardize the interpretation of the rules, and to encourage a dress code for umpires.

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Two New Life Members Elected

The Annual Meeting unanimously, and with generous acclamation, elected two new Life Members: Trevor Flint and Robin Radford.

Trevor Flint has served NZ Table Tennis successively as a top-level player, a top-level coach, and in later years as an energetic administrator for Table Tennis Canterbury. His playing days peaked in the early 1950s when he won multiple doubles titles and reached the 1953 NZ men’s singles final. He represented Canterbury on more than 200 occasions. He turned to coaching in 1964 and his high standards led eventually to his appointment as NZ Director of Coaching. He coached NZ teams on overseas trips from 1971-1978. In Canterbury he has managed national tournaments and the 1999 Wheelchair Games.

Robin Radford has been actively involved in a wide range of table tennis activity since 1959 when he was first elected to the Waikato Association Management Committee. He was a leading figure in the complex restructure of Waikato table tennis which split the original Association into three. He was also a Waikato representative player. He later moved to Kapiti and was a principal motivator behind a range of initiatives which vastly improved local playing conditions. At national level he served on the NZTTA Management Committee from 1982 to 1993 and since 1996 has worked energetically and creatively on TTNZ’s main news-distribution outlets: the TTNZ website and Table Tennis Info magazine.

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Hillary Commission Funds New Coaching Booklet

As a result of a generous promotional initiative by the Hillary Commission, TTNZ was able to print and distribute a run of several thousand copies of a pocket-size coaching booklet at no cost to themselves. It contained generic coaching tips and reproduced key parts of existing table tennis coaching manuals and the KiwiSport manual. It was distributed widely, and in large numbers, to all associations.

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Australian Academy Team Visits NZ

A team of 5 boys aged under 20 from the Wah Sing Academy in New South Wales visited New Zealand in January and played friendly matches in Christchurch, Nelson and Auckland against teams in the same age-group.

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