Aiming to grow the game

That is according to Otilia Badescu, a Romanian great who has brought a wealth of experience to her role as GTTA development officer and has some key goals for the sport’s future.

While Guernsey is already impressively accomplished in table tennis, she feels that much could be done to help bring on even more success, and in different areas too.

‘The problem is that we don’t have too many girls, even in our day, [who are] 15 or 16 years old,’ said Badescu, who has been in her current role since September 2017.

‘But it’s good because we have a new generation that we hope keep going on in table tennis – maybe we can develop a team aged 7-8 years old and in the future, it could be the Guernsey team for the girls.

‘We handle very well the category of 7-10 years old, but also we cover the kids between 12 and 14 – but sometimes we are struggling because on the island, they are doing many kinds of sport.

‘This is kind of a problem because they can’t come in too often in the sessions and the progress is coming slowly ... my opinion is that the kids, the players, should be involved more in one sport, not to share with other sports.’

The former European champion provides much authority as she explains why, in her opinion, table tennis is such a beautiful game.

‘Table tennis is not an easy sport, it’s second after chess for a sport of mind,’ she added.

‘If you’re not able to concentrate and be ready to do the hard practice, it’s hard to get ready for the match and it can be quite hard to manage ... we need the coaches involved to get good results, but for this we need the player to be ready to do it.

‘The people involved in table tennis – they need to believe this is a mind sport.

‘You need to show the beauty of sport like table tennis with what you’re doing, all the technique, tactics and what you put inside.’

How can the sport be promoted further on a local scale?

Badescu provides some interesting and quite novel ideas – namely exhibition matches – as the recent CI Top 12 Championship unfolds in the background, with perhaps fewer spectators than she would have wished for.

‘We need more public from outside to come in and watch our competitions – now, it’s the main competition, in the future we need the public to support the players,’ she said.

‘We need mass media to be with us to show the beauty of sport – a couple days before to inform the public.

‘Most of the Europe countries, sometimes they promote it in a shopping centre, like an exhibition game. In Guernsey, Saturday afternoon, everybody’s in the town – we need something to show the people this is a sport and this is how they do it.’

GTTA president Derek Webb is pleased to have Badescu driving the local development plans forwards.

‘For the top inexperienced players, it’s fantastic, because they’ve got somebody who knows how to win the game – she’ll be very good on the tactical side for our top players as she’s got that experience,’ said Webb, who made the link initially with the renowned coach through Bristol Academy player Daisy Kershaw.

Webb backs Badescu’s comments about keeping players on the tables, but is quick to point out that Guernsey’s top players are good enough to vie with the Home Countries – an impressive level of accomplishment for the island.

The current local leagues carry on into April, but there are many other competitive attractions for the island’s crop of players.

The Island and Channel Islands Championships will take place in late March and late April respectively following an earlier rescheduling, while Webb is also pleased to say that Guernsey will then host the Senior Schools’ International for a third time at the end of June.

‘We’ll be expecting in excess of 100 players – England, Scotland, Wales, plus Jersey and the Isle of Man will be coming for that,’ he said.

The other pinnacle of summer will be the Island Games, and Webb is hopeful that the Sarnians can extend their enviable winning record as they head out to Gibraltar.

‘We’ll be top seeds – we’ve won the team gold for the last three Games,’ he added.