Bath Street Marine Table Tennis Club
A Table Tennis England PremierClub
News Release - BSMTTC News 169
Dateline: 20 January 2024
50/50 Week!
It has been a 50/50 kind of week for the club's teams in the Liverpool Table Tennis League, Frank Murphy Veterans Handicap Cup competition. A team event in which the club has a very strong tradition, and is the current holder of the trophy! We had 4 teams in action this week in Round 2, but will have just 2 teams proceeding to the Quarter Finals. Here is the account of their fortunes!
Monday
The week started with the all fourth division standard BSM 2 team facing Merseyside Police 1, from the third division, but whose line-up included former division 1 player, Paul Gittins an extremely good player in this type of competition. By agreement the match was played at Marine, and with both home advantage and a 147 point handicap advantage there was an outside chance the BSM team could upset the form book. But the fact was that, on the night, all 3 of the Police players proved too strong for the BSM boys, meaning that they were able to win every single game! Despite that it still took 7 sets out of 9 before the Police side were able to clear off the handicap deficit. There was some really good table tennis and the BSM boys certainly fought for every point, with the whole match played in an excellent spirit. Nevertheless, at the end of the day it was the Police team who were ahead and move into the next round.
Above: The BSM 2 team of Mark Benson, Harry Hobson and Peter Crichton and alongside the match card for Merseyside Police 1 v BSM 2.
And, to the left - two members of the Merseyside Police 1 team, Paul Gittins and Tom Purcell. Somehow, Tony Mullaley seems to have escaped the camera!
Wednesday
Wednesday saw the current holders of the cup, in the guise of BSM 4 this year, in action and visiting Arriva. The all first division BSM boys faced opponents from the third division. Was a cup shock on the cards? After all the BSM boys faced a 144 point handicap deficit at the start! This BSM team however has quality written all the way through it, and there was no way they were going to drop any games! It took just 6 sets for them to draw level and then finish with a flurry, ending up 72 points ahead! It was a great experience for the very experienced Arriva team, but they just had no answer to the quality of division 1. The BSM 4 team march on, can they again make it all the way.....
Above - the match card Arriva 1 v BSM 4. BSM winning the match 272 points to 344.
And to the left. The Arriva 1 Team - Wacek Bondek, Pavel Tomczyk and Peter Jackson. Followed by the BSM 4 team of Matthew Wilson, Lawrence Kenwright and Colin Turner.
Thursday
It is always a little disappointing when the club ends up with a derby match in a cup competition as it means that one of the two teams will not progress any further! This was exactly the situation on Thursday when the all division 2 line-up captained by Dave Stoddern and playing as BSM 3 faced BSM 5 captained by Andy Armstrong. On this occasion, neither team captain was actually playing in the match! For BSM 3, it was great to see Ken Jackson back in action in Liverpool after his most recent extended visit to the USA and he was joined by the 'Dave's', Noden & McMahon. A very decent side. Andy however had Julian Quirk from Div 2 and two first division stars in the form of Keith Williams and Steve Green. An extremely strong line-up. Just 56 points in favour of BSM 3 separated the teams on handicap, so a monumental effort from BSM 3 would be needed if they were going to hang on to that advantage. There were some terrific games of table tennis in this match, and great live coverage on the Liverpool League Facebook page - well worth a look! But the fact is, that the quality of the higher ranked players shone through. Ken fought hard but these days was not able to relive his best form - when he may well have matched Steve and Keith. The Dave's also fought hard but just didn't have the quality to match their higher ranked opponents. The BSM 5 team had cleared the handicap deficit and were ahead by set 3. They just didn't look back, going on to win the match by a decisive margin of 96 points. Andy will be able to take his team through to another round.
To the right the match card for
BSM 5 v BSM 3
and to the left, the players:
Dave McMahon, Julian Quirk, Ken Jackson, Keith Williams, Dave Noden and Steve Green.
And below a couple of great action pictures courtesy of Ray Hibbs Photography.
And in conclusion.......
That leaves the club with two teams through to the Quarter Final BSM 4 & BSM 5, once again showing that quality players will inevitably win through even in a handicap competition. Let's see what the draw brings.....