Addicted to Table Tennis - Golden Oldie

Table tennis is one of the most skilful and dynamic games on the planet. Face a good player and you will be bamboozled by an almost endless variety of spin: loop, chop, side, mixed... Mostly mixed indeed. Some of the hitting and “killing” can be as fast and aggressive as a display of karate. Maybe that’s why the Chinese and Japanese (and their neighbours!) are so adept at the game. The similarities are obvious to me. Put another way, table tennis can be like a civilised form of boxing. The player can indeed feel quite alone at that table, just like a boxer in the ring. True, in a league game your team-mates can encourage you (but not coach), but they cannot lift a finger to help you.

In England, where I play in my local league, players use the term “ping pong” rather disparagingly. For us, ping pong is when two ultra defensive players endlessly tap or push the ball back and forth. Actually a good chop defender can be very successful up to a point. At the top levels the “three ball attacker” (serve, return, instant loop\drive) is king. Modern blades and rubbers (which make up “bats” as we call them here) have long since made fast spin-play the dominant style. Power to these players, I say. They make the game fast and beautiful.

As for me, I started playing regularly in 1970, in the Huddersfield University (then “Polytechnic”) Education Department common room. Bats were provided: hard wood with pimples out and no sponge beneath the rubber. I remember being very pleased when I managed to produce some topspin with such a bat. To be fair, modern pimple-in sponge rubber only appeared in the 1950s, so having a hard-bat then was the norm. I actually bought a reverse-pimple sponge bat then (D13), but kept this back for more serious play.

I actually played about four matches for the polytechnic in the local league (Division Eight!). The legality of this was questionable: I had to answer to the name “Alex”! I won most of my games until we faced some promotion candidates who were decent chop players. I kept trying to topspin the chop and putting the ball into the net. After a severe beating I decided table tennis was not for me! Later, I found a book on table tennis techniques, featuring how to block and push chop before opening up with a high loop. So I soon returned to the game! Earlier I had lost the Polytechnic Closed Men’s Final to a pure pusher, again from lack of experience.

Since those days I have played in four other local leagues. In fact I have played in Humberside since 1982. I was absent, however, for one of our most spectacular matches. The lads were playing at a fire-station and the alarm went off! Yes, a horde of fire-fighters slid down those poles and charged past our players. Must have been unforgettable... Enough for now.  

© Paul Butters, Yorkshire, Sunday 19\9\2010 at 21.40.

Table Tennis Memories (Golden Oldie)

(WELCOME Philip Yang - Grimsby\Cleethorpes)

My earliest recollection of playing Table Tennis was on a kitchen table. TT nets and hard bats were cheap then. The tables I played on in various houses were about a quarter the size of an official one, if that. When I was about eleven I was winning all my games. Then a new friend beat me and I burst into tears! I hate admitting this now, but the upside was that his dad took me aside to give me some tips. In fact he taught me how to hold the bat correctly with my forefinger running across the base of the blade (Western Grip).

I then remember playing a few games at school. The full table seemed enormous then, and mostly we pushed the ball about. In the sixth form there was a school team player who had a great backhand flick. He sort of turned over the ball in a lovely curve, all from the wrist. I copied this and it remains my best shot at fifty eight. At about sixteen I impressed with my retrieving and pushing. One guy complained that he would hit a hard shot, and then, very late, my arm would stretch out to lob it back. I had no attack however.

College really got me started as a regular player. Our common room had a table and hard bats. We played “Winner stays on” and after a short while I was playing most of the time! I must have got cocky (as in bigheaded) because my fellow students dubbed me Alvin (Lee) after the rock star. In 1971 I reached the final of the polytechnic closed championship, winning my first medal. Actually I only received the medal when the PE Department tracked me down playing lawn tennis. I hadn’t realised a medal was on offer... In the final I was well beaten about 21-10, 21-12 by a very steady pusher. Something to learn from.

As I reported earlier, I made my league (Division 8!) debut for the polytechnic soon after.  I played about four matches under the name Alex (to save on league subscriptions)! In my third match or so I came up against some decent chop players, who gave me a heavy mauling. I felt like quitting the game and not making a fool of myself any more. Instead, however, I consulted a TT book and learnt how to play against chop.

My next memory was in the late 1970s when I was a secondary school English teacher. Some sixth formers approached me and asked if I would form a new league team with them. We had three years of enormous success: they learnt and improved at a phenomenal rate. I well recollect my first league match for them, against a “Coal Board” team. My first opponent, knowing we were new, insisted on crashing every ball away with every shot of his warm-up! Intimidation or what? I was annoyed. He made me determined to win, if I could. I could and did! A year or so later a higher division player used the same tactic against me in the closed championship quarter-final. During the knock-up I hardly touched the ball. First game, I won 21-9, on my way to the semi...

Another story I like to tell is about when I missed our match at the local fire station. The lads told me the alarm went off during play and hordes of fire-fighters shot down the poles and past them!

In 1982 I moved to Humberside (East England) and joined the local league there. Yes I’m heading for thirty years in that league, most of them in Division Two. That’s another story. This year I’m having my third crack at Division One. That will be like going into the English Association Football Premiership. Another “Learning Curve” for me.

© Paul Butters, Yorkshire. Monday 20\9\2010 at 20.10.