FOR RUBBERS AND BLADES RING OR WRITE 14th EUROPEAN Rose Bank Sports CHAMPIONSHIPS also for other T.T. equipment/ clothing at Discount Prices RETREA T FROM NOW AT: 119 WITTON STREET MOSCOW NORTHWICH, CHESHIRE Telephone: 0606-48989 (day) by George R. 0978-760249 (after hours) ROLL OF HONOUR Men's Singles Wome-n's Singles VALENTINA POPOVA SPARE A THOUGHT ULF BENGTSSON (Sweden) (Soviet Union) Inevitably with the close of a season Women's Doubles stalwarts who have devoted them­ Men's Doubles NARINE ANTONYAN and selves to the administration of our ZORAN KALINIC and VALENTINA POPOVA game - some for a great many years­ DRAGUTIN SURBEK (Soviet Union) decide to call it a day. It was ever (Yugoslavia) thus, of course, and can sympathise with match secretaries in particular Mixed Doubles for they are the most often JACQUES SECRETIN and VALENTINA POPOVA con·fronted with frustration. (France) (Soviet Union) Last minute cry-ofts refusals to Women's Team play, allied to the door to door tran­ Men's Team SOVIET UNION sportation often demanded, do not FRANCE make for an easy life. Small wonder "the the cry goes Lip enough is enough. One reads from letters to the Editor the need f.or more professionalism No less ·successful than either CONSOLATION from administrators, more par­ Napoleon or Hitler in their· assaults What consolation there was came ticularly in the hierarchy bracket. on the Soviet capital, England's efforts from England's women who finished' But they too are unpaid devotees .to prise reward from the seven events sixth in their Category One encounters, travelling the country most week­ making up the 14th European three places down on that obtained in ends and otherwis"e applying them­ Championships in Moscow, overthe Buda pest two years previously, as selves to the day to day functioning of period April 14/22, 1984, also met opposed to the men's slide from fifth the ·national body just as, at a lower with abject failure. to twelfth. level, others, just as devoutly, apply Indeed, for the" first time ever, Both Alison Gordon and Joy Grundy themselves equally England failed to win a single medal carried England's colours into the It isa players' game to be sure, but and suffered the further ignominy of last sixteen of the women's singles without the back-up needed, and this being relegated to Category Two in before losing, respectively, to Kirsten in the case of the ETTA is provided by the men's team event - again for the of Federal Germany and­ professionals, there would be a sorry first time. Gordana Perkucin of Yugoslavia. of affairs prevailing. Spare a Their only win in seven matches For the record France won the men's thought then for the amateurs, those was by a nail-biting 5-4 against team event, beating Poland 5-3 in the people who keep the clubs, leagues, Bulgaria suffering defeats by Sweden final, and in the women's team event counties going. Few bouquets (5-2), . Hungary (5-2), France (5-3), final the Soviet Union beat Yugoslavia come their way but brickbats are Norway (5-2) (!), Germany (5­ 3-0. Russia's Valentina Popova bad plentiful and often thrown without 3) and finally, by fellow demotees, the distinction of winning four gold regard to a personal undertaking Italy also by 5-3! medals, three in the individual events which is simply motivated by a desire Of the 20 sets won in these seven and one in the championships. to see our game prosper in all its matches Desmond Douglas claimed But what of the men's singles won facets. Carl Preanfour, and Graham by Sweden's fifth-ranked player Ulf Sandley, Alan Cooke and Kenny Bengtsson in succession to his com­ Jackson one each. Nor did England's patriot M ikael Appelgren, the winner fortunes change much in the individual in Budapest, and an absentee in ENGLISH TABLE TENNIS events with Sandley withdrawing Moscow because of injury. ASSOCIATION completely with a back injury and Ulf, born on Jan. 27, 1960, and Patron: Her Majesty The Queen. ousted on his first encounter in Swedish junior cha.mpion both in . President: M. Goldstein, O.B.E. the men's singles by Francois Farout 1977 and 1978, .was the thirteenth of France. seed in Moscow and yet he was the Life Vice-President: Both Cooke and Jackson had first one to through and win the gold Hon. Ivor Montagu. round wins against Scotland's Dave medal. fellow c·ountryman, Jan Chairman: T. Blunn. Hannah and Peter Stellwag of Federal Ove-Waldner, the top seed and beaten Deputy Chairman: G. R. Yates. Germany respectively, subsequently finalist in Bud.apest, failed to live up to Hon. Treasurer: A. Drapkin. losing to Tibor Klampar and Zsolt his Top 12 triumph, when beaten by General Secretary: A. W. Shipley. Kriston of Hungary. "The Guardsman", Josef Dvoracek of Management Committee: Douglas, England's only real hope, Czechoslovakia in a gripping third had a win over Ron van Spanje of the round encounter which had Nils (Vice-Chairmen) Netherlands but then fell to yet another the Swedish Association's P. Charters, C. J. Clemett, Hungarian, Gabor Gergely, being General Secretary, unable to look. A. E. Ransome, N. K. Reeve, beaten 3-1 after winning the first Two other higher ranked Swedes, E. G. White. game. Erik Lindh and Ulf also fell by 3 the wayside, the former to Bengtsson STRUGGLE with a final win against the Swedes, in the quarters and the latter seen off Young Cooke came out on top of a Lindh and Waldner. by the beaten finalist Andrzej Grubba five game struggle with Anglo/Scot SCRATCHING of Poland. Hannah and stood at one game all with In this latter event Sandley's scratch­ JOOLA AWARDS Klampar who subsequently took the ing left Cooke sitting on the bench next two for victory whilst Prean, in whilst Prean and Jackson were French ace Jacques Secretin who receipt of a first-round bye, fell to the ceremoniously despatched by Gergely had done so much in spearheading his French No.5 Farout. and Istvan Jonyer of Hungary 7 and 9. country to the team champion­ What then of girls in the Minor Douglas, in harness with RalfWosik of ship which earned him the Joola Arena of the Lenin Stadium complex? Federal Germany, progressed to the Award - Sweden's Marie Lindblad Could they do any better? Why, yes, quarters there to be beaten by was the counterpart women's winner­ they could and did with both Alison Bengtsson and Carlsson having ousted fell to Bela Mesaros of Yugoslavia in Gordon, our most successful player the Scots Hannah and Richard Yule, his first encounter. and Joy Grundy, no less overawed, and the two K' s, Klampar and Kriston. But, still full of fight, Yugoslavia's reaching the last sixteen. Karen, in the counterpart women's battler supreme, Dragutin Surbek, Alison began the dismissal of event, at last tasted success when, fought his way through to the semis Denmark's Charlotte Polk, 15 in the partnered by Alison, the English pair there to lose in straight games to 5th, to be followed with another 5th qualified for the first round proper in Grubba after ousting the likes of game success overthe Soviet Union' s beating Elisabeth Maier and Elisabeth Gergely and Dvoracek, the latter John Elena but sadly failed to Deistler of Austria but their joy was Hilton' s final victim in Berne. reach the quarters when beaten by short lived when beaten 15 and 9 by Andrei Mazunov, Russia's 16-years- ' Joy's victories were accom­ the Russians Khasanova Raisa old counterpart to England's Prean, plished against Sandra de Kruiff of the Timofeeva. Joy and Lisa, in Round 1, really excelled in reaching the semis Netherlands, Edit Urban of Hungary, fell to qualifiers Beatrice Abgrall of from an unseeded position his victims beaten -19, 17, 15 and 20, and Italy' s France and Ivana Masarikova of being Engelbert Huging, of Federal Allessandra Busnardo losing out to Czechoslovakia who won 16, -18,18. Germany, Jonny Akesson of Sweden Perkucin. And so to the mixed, our last chance (25-23 in the 5th!) and Yugoslavia's to make any Both Jackson, in giant penholder Zoran Kalinic prior to partnership with Barbro Wiktorsson of losing to Bengtsson having in his Sweden, and Cooke, paired with Joy, opening gambit seen off Stefan Renold came through two qualifying rounds of Switzerland. unscathed. But there the success story Many fancied Grubba in the final ends with respective defeats by against Bengtsson especially after his Michael Daugaard and Dorte Hauth of exploits in winning the Federal Repub­ Denmark and by Yule and Carole lic of Germany's men's singles title Dalrymple of Scotland. with wins over Appelgren, Carlsson Prean and Lisa beat Ron van Spanje and Douglas en route to beating and de Kruiff in their first round meeting Waldner in the final. but then fell to Jorgen Persson and Pia But it was not to be although, like a Eliasson of Sweden whilst our top pendulum, swayed first to the pairing of Des and Alison, after beating Swede and then to the Pole and when Japp van Spanje and Ellen Bakker of it came to the fifth and decisive game the Netherlands, took their dismissal it was Bengtsson, cool calm and at the hands of Igor Solopov and collected, who made it against the :Bulatova two stout defenders, And nervous and agitated Grubba. there is was, all over and without a No English player was called upon medal.