Lancaster A team lost 14-3 (Jim Cao, Liang Wen, Reeve Lo, Alasdair Fuller), 4 points.
Lancaster B team wins 12-5 (David Bruce, Rowan Campbell, Joe Breen, Kris Hawkes), 2 points.
Lancaster B team pulled off an impressive performance on Saturday night, achieving a smashing victory against York’s B team! Unfortunately the same can’t be said for the A team that, whilst putting on an admirable performance, was unable to match York’s strong A team.
When asked, the York players felt that their main strength lay in their A team, and indeed their hopes were vindicated as their A team built up a lead in the opening matches, the only resistance coming from Lancaster’s star performer Jim Cao, who swept away his opponents with comparable ease, winning three of his four matches. In spite of this, Lancaster’s first team were simply not good enough to challenge York’s A team. Although this was a disappointment, it was not a surprise – Lancaster’s coach Graham Coupe had predicted that the A team would lose, having seen the quality of York’s team, but the same cannot be said for the B team.
In quite remarkable style Rowan Campbell, David Bruce, Joe Breen and Kris Hawkes played superbly, outclassing a strong York team. Undoubtedly, with such a great performance it is difficult to single out one player, but Rowan Campbell deservedly gained the Man Of The Match award, for winning every game he played. Rowan commented that he was “honoured” to be the B team’s most valuable player: “I didn’t expect to win all of my matches, but I was pleased with my overall performance”.
Perhaps the best performance of the day, however, came from the crowd who stayed in good numbers cheering and applauding the spectacle for the whole three hours. The turnout was hardly surprising considering that Lancaster’s table tennis club has been going from strength to strength, winning the Team of the Year and being nominated for Club of the Year last year. Losing any points to York in Roses for the first time in three years has been difficult pill for the team to swallow. David Bruce, the Lancaster table tennis club president, said that “this year has been great, and we can be very proud of ourselves but there is always room for improvement and next year we want to build upon these two points and gain all 6 points!”
