Southend Juniors go close in Essex Junior Interleague

Southend and District Juniors were close runners up in the Essex Junior Interleague title in Colchester, Sat 22 Jan 2011.

The competition was open to all leagues in Essex and the team for each match consisted of 4 juniors. Southend and District Table Tennis League representative team consisted of 5 players Owen Warren, Kieran Skeggs, Charlie Bates, Emily Godfrey & Steve Marr. Four leagues competed for the Essex Junior crown.

Each team had to list their players in ranking order and the 1 and 2 ranked players played both the oppositions 1 and 2 players together with a doubles match. The same applied for players ranked 3 and 4.

Southend juniors were off to a flying start and, after some close matches, the team of Owen, Kieran, Charlie & Steve all performed brilliantly to be unbeaten and earned a 10-0 victory over the Colchester team.

Emily Godfrey joined Owen, Kieran & Charlie against the Chelmsford juniors. Owen was again unbeaten in the singles against the 1st & 2^nd Chelmsford seeds. Charlie & Emily were also unbeaten against the 3^rd & 4^th seeds & won the doubles in 3 straight sets, resulting in an impressive 7-3 victory for Southend.

Southend juniors were joint leaders before the showdown with Clacton in the last match of the day. Both teams had won 17 points from 2 matches. Steve Marr supported Kieran, Charlie & Emily and the match went to the wire. After Kieran had beaten the Clacton 2^nd seed, then came the shock result of Charlie beating, high Essex ranked, James Denyer in a 5 set thriller. At 4-4 in the match, it was beginning to look as if there was a chance of Southend juniors taking the Essex crown. In the last match of the day Steve Marr was left with the weight on his shoulders to share the points with Clacton. A nail biting finish saw Steve rising to the occasion and almost succeeding - against the odds - in another very close 5 setter.

It was an excellent and enjoyable day for all 4 leagues with Clacton (23pts) taking the honours and Southend juniors were runners up with 21 points from a possible 30.

All 5 Southend juniors must be congratulated for their outstanding performance.

Paul Skeggs
Team captain.