The eighteenth annual running of the Cippenham Team 1-Star Open on Sunday was the best ever according to Organiser Graham Trimming. This competition, devised by Cippenham Table Tennis Club, allows for teams of two rather than individual players and, after the preliminary round groups, features a progressive knock-out format that produces a final ranking list of all twenty-four teams.

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All the four seeded teams made it through their preliminary round groups in first place although Lobsters did require a decider against Erith TTC but won that match 2-1 thanks to a brace from Ho Yin Tam. In fact, the only one of the eight top-ranked teams that failed win their group was the father and son duo Radovan and Branislav Zivkovic who succumbed to the Titans represented by Craig Brown and Matthew Horrocks. Both those teams however, managed to navigate a route into the top eight with Zivkovic’s eventually finishing one place higher than Titans in sixth place after having beaten top-eight-ranked The Smashers in round two.

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Surprise of the day was the successful run of The Pong Fathers. With neither player, Nick Howard nor Adrian Piotrowski, on the national men’s ranking list they finished second in their group to The A Team and then went on a run of victories over The Underdogs (Luke Rickett & Connor Wood) and The Dynamic Duo (Ioan-Alexandru Anghel & Mario Ioakim) before losing to eventual runners-up HKers in the quarter-final. They then beat Titans and Zivkovic’s to finish in a creditable fifth place. The Dynamic Duo went on to finish down in eleventh place despite Anghel remaining unbeaten during the day.

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The semi-finals were played out between four of the top five ranked teams. The losers of the semis played for positions three and four and that resulted in victory for The A Team, Adam Jepson and Adam Gigli, over Isle of Wight, Paul Rainford and Ryan Cates, in a repeat of the result of their earlier match in round one. This marked a personal success for Jepson, the highest ranked individual player in the competition, who was one of four players that remained unbeaten through the day.

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The other two unbeaten players featured in teams that met in the final. This match was a long and exciting affair won by Kidlington TTC courtesy of wins for James Rule and Lewis Waddup over Chun Yu Chan. This was after Hkers, whose name referenced the Hong Kong heritage of their players, had taken a 1-0 lead after Lok Yee Lo, once ranked within the top 350 women in the world, had defeated Waddup. Lo was the other player to win all her matches during the day.

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Of the Cippenham contingent of players in the draw, Maciej Dlugozima was the most successful individually with six wins from his nine matches while the highest placed team was Slaps Backspin, in tenth position, featuring the youngsters Louis Alexander and Bharath Prasanna Kumar.

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The tournament was organised by Graham Trimming and refereed by Sue Hayes.

 

Results:

1. Kidlington TTC: Lewis Waddup & James Rule

2. HKers: Lok Yee Lo & Chun Yu Chan

3. The A Team: Adam Jepson & Adam Gigli

4. Isle of Wight: Paul Rainford & Ryan Cates

5. The Pong Fathers: Nick Howard & Adrian Piotrowski

6. Zivkovic’s: Branislav Zivkovic & Radovan Zivkovic

7. Titans: Craig Brown & Matthew Horrocks

8. Lobsters: Ho Yin Tam & Alexsandr Klimenko