Article by Donald Pirie

The UK championships for senior schools took place in Douglas, Isle of Man over the first weekend in July. This operates each year as a seven nation event, with hosts Isle of Man joining teams from Scotland, England, Wales, and Ireland, as well as teams from both Guernsey and Jersey. ASV TT Academy and Aberdeen were heavily represented across the 2x2 player teams in both the boys’ and girls’ events, covering U14, U16 and U18 players.

_{Scottish team for Senior Schools International Championships 2024
National Sports Centre, Douglas, Isle of Man}

Kiishi Adekola (Robert Gordons School) and Nikki Mo (St Machar Academy) in the girls U14 Scottish girls’ teams, with Maja Wojcicka (Turriff Academy) in the girls U16 Scottish Team.

Over in the boys’ events, Ben Stewart (Banchory Academy), Robbie Martin (Bucksburn Academy), and Jakub Krzyzostaniak (St Machar Academy) were all part of the U16 Scottish Teams.The event starts with the team event, and each nation has two pairs of players taking part, giving a total of 14 teams across each group.

In the U16 girls, Maja teamed up with Megan Mulhern from Glasgow. In a very competitive event, the girls managed to secure the Bronze Medal for Scotland, getting things off to a great start.

_{Megan & Maja}

This gave the U14 girls the spark they were looking for, and after unlucky semi-final losses, but Scotland teams found themselves in the Bronze medal match, so a second medal was guaranteed at that point.

Kiishi teamed with Nichole Lee (Edinburgh), and faced off against clubmate Nikki alongside Alexandra Hart (Stirling). Kiishi and Nichole were the stronger pairing on paper, and so it proved to be the case with them taking the Bronze medal, leaving Nikki and Alexandra in a credible 4th place.

_{Kiishi & Nicole}

There was a symmetry in the U16 boys event, with both teams finding themselves in the Bronze medal match, but again another team medal was secured. Jakub teamed with Ben Hart (Stirling) and faced clubmates of Robbie & Ben. Like the girls’ event, it was the theoretical stronger pairing of Jakub and Ben who took the Bronze medal victory, again leaving Robbie & Ben in a very credible 4th place.

_{Jakub & Ben}

After the team events, it was onto the individual singles event to round out the weekend. With very strong players on show from England, Ireland & Wales, this was always going to be a big ask from the Scottish players.

Kiishi led the way for the Aberdeen contingent, making it through to the semi-final stage of the U14 girls singles. It was the English number one Kiishi was up against, and with non-standard 'pimpled' rubber on the English players bat, this was always going to be a tough ask for Kiishi, and went down 1-3 in the end.

Robbie produced the best performance for the Aberdeen players in the boys U16 event, making it through to the last 8, and despatching club-mate Ben in the last 16. Jakub also made it through to the last 16 of the same event.

All in all, a good performance from the Aberdeen players as part of the Scotland team, taking home 3 Bronze medals from a National event.

This weekend sees the European Youth Championships taking place in Sweden, with Harry Blackhall (Kemnay), Maja Wojcicka, and Jakub Krzyzostaniak all winning International caps for Scotland. Good luck to all three!