Guernsey’s elite make step up to the Championship
GUERNSEY will keep faith with the quartet who earned them promotion when they begin life in the heady heights of the Championship this weekend.
Although the local season does not officially start for the island’s elite players until Wednesday 19 September, when the top flight of the Doric League gets under way, they return to competitive action before that in the opening round of matches in a new season of the Senior British League for the two Ravenscroft teams.
The Sarnians have flourished in this competition and the first team are making their debut in the Championship tier of the structure.
Following the overhaul a few seasons ago into a pyramid system, the Championship division is the second highest and will give a great opportunity for the Sarnians to test themselves against some of the top players in Britain.
The first team’s action will take place at the Corby Smash Table Tennis Centre in Northamptonshire.
A large difference this season for the squad will be an extra weekend of fixtures due to the fact that there are 10 teams in the division, two more than the usual perm of eight.
Guernsey’s leading side is unsurprisingly made up of the four players who earned the promotion to the Championship last season and also memorably won team gold at the NatWest Island Games in Gotland last year. More recently, they overcame their Jersey rivals in the Green Trophy inter-insular encounter.
They are led by Channel Islands number one Garry Dodd and he will be supported by Joshua Stacey, Lawrence Stacey and Ben Foss.
It is often difficult to gauge the strength of teams prior to the first round of fixtures, but a review of each club’s ranking list generally gives an idea as to how strong each will be.
It looks like the majority of teams within the Championship will have four players within the equivalent of top 100 ranking in England, so the standard will be very high.
The highest-ranked player in the division looks to be Team GB British Paralympian player Kim Daybell, who is ranked 20 in England.
A second Ravenscroft team will again be competing in the British League structure this season and the venue for action in National C-6 will be the Generation II Table Tennis Club in Fareham, the same location as last season.
The second team has been an extremely useful tool in developing some of the island’s improving juniors and there will be a good opportunity for ensuring that this continues with the squad selected.
Paul Hainsworth will once more take charge of the team, which includes juniors Daniel Collenette, Ryan Bichard and Matthew Casey.
All of the youngsters have experienced SBL action over the past few seasons and are now firmly established players in the local First Division.
Forresters II look to have the strongest team in the division and they are the first opponents of the season for the Guernsey side.
