Garry Dodd, left, takes on Jersey’s Josh Band in Guangzhou. (0541370)
THE Guernsey men’s table tennis team have travelled more than 6,000 miles to China – to beat Jersey.
The two islands have been drawn in the same Division Four group at the World Team Championships held in the northern city of Guangzhou and were pulled out of the bag to face each other in the first round yesterday.
But it was the Sarnians who were celebrating afterwards with a memorable 3-1 victory.
‘Jersey are gutted and we are very, very ecstatic,’ said the Guernsey Table Tennis Association president, Derek Webb, who is with the team in the Far East.
‘When we saw the draw and we’d come all this way and we had Jersey – it was a bit strange. We didn’t really want to play them, but they are in our group.
‘We’ve knocked them down a peg or two.’
Garry Dodd was the star for the Sarnians.
The 17-year-old defeated Jersey’s top player and development officer Craig Gascoyne 3-0, with the scores 11-6, 11-8 and 12-10.
‘Garry played absolutely brilliantly and that was the first time that Gascoyne had lost to a Guernsey person,’ said Webb.
Gascoyne had defeated Scott Romeril 3-0 in the opening game before Dodd came on and beat Josh Band.
The youngest member of the Guernsey team, 14-year-old Ollie Langlois, also tasted victory with a 3-0 win over Chris Corfield.
They now face Republic of Congo at 10am local time today.
The other countries in their group are Iraq, Iceland and Benin.
‘We’re on a high,’ said Webb.
‘The more games we can win, the higher up the rankings we go.’
The Guernsey women’s team have had a tougher time in Division Three, Group K.
In their first run-out on Sunday, they met Macau.
The former Portuguese colony on the Chinese coast won 3-0.
The greens team of Dawn Morgan, Becks O’Keefe and Alice Loveridge then faced El Salvador and Loveridge, who has received funding from Cenkos for the trip, got the better of Estefania Ramiros 3-0.
But the Central American country took the honours 3-1.
Then up against Montenegro last night, they narrowly lost 3-2.
‘It was a great performance and it was very exciting,’ said Webb.
‘They are disappointed but it was a heartening performance.’
Loading ...
Share this article:
What are these?