Gloucestershire Cadets Benjamin Greve and Tom Powlesland played in the South West Regional Table Tennis Championships in Plymouth at the weekend with both boys, looking to earn selection for the Regional team at the national team championships in May.

In the group stages, Greve came through a gruelling five setter after being two sets down, then breezed through the other games to win his group.

Powlesland also qualified from his group as a runner with a win and a loss.

Unfortunately, the county team mates had to meet each other in the next round with the winner automatically qualifying for the inter-regional finals. Neither player could gain ascendency as the lead changed hands several times with Tom taking the lead but then having to come from two one down to take the match into a decider.

Benjamin squeezed home 11 -9 in the final set, clinching the automatic qualification. This meant that Tom had to go into a final qualifying play-off with Devon’s Ptolemy Behan.

Tom took his chance and played his strongest game of the day, winning o decisively three games to nil, securing the final qualification spot.

Benjamin continued to the semifinals where he lost by three games to one to the number three in the country, Somerset’s  Bertie Kelly. However, this was tempered by the fact that he had already qualified for the South West Regional Team That will play in the finals on May 12 and 13th in Cosford.

Congratulations to both boys, this is the first time that Two Gloucestershire players have qualified for the under 13 team in this national team championships.

Eddie Roofe