Outstanding results on the international stage for the city's Archway Table Tennis Club stars
Archway Table Tennis Club stars have been excelling for England on the international stage.
The city club’s Kai Lun Chow beat the third seed on his way to picking up a brilliant bronze medal at the World Table Tennis Youth Contender Otocec in Slovenia.
And Archway girls Cindy Xiao, Amber Lemmon and Hannah Saunders delivered the best English results at the Euro Mini Championships in France for 15 years.
Chow beat the third seed on his way to the semi-finals. Having got through to the knockout stage of the U13 Boys’ Singles as a group runner-up – he was beaten by top seed Alexander Malov of Spain – Chow beat the higher-ranked Olaf Glanert of Poland in the last 16 and then impressively defeated third seed Louis Fegerl of Austria in five sets in the quarter-finals.
His run ended in the semis as he was beaten in four by Wu Yuan-Kai of Chinese Taipei, who went on to defeat Malov in the final. Chow also competed in the under 15 competition and reached the last 32 where he went out to third seed Francesco Trevisan of Italy.
Xiao secured an excellent 7th place finish in Schiltigheim. She topped her group in three different group stages of the U11 Girls competition, though she did have a sticky moment in the second phase, coming from 2-0 down to beat Kriszta Ungvari of Romania 3-2.
Xiao then won two knockout round before her run came to an end in the quarter-finals as she lost out to Switzerland’s Emily Wu 3-1 (7-11, 14-12, 11-2, 11-4). She then lost to Juana Morales of Spain 15-13 in the fifth set in the first play-of for positions 5-8, but ended with a victory over Aybige Feride Ustunday of Turkey to seal 7th place.
Saunders and Lemmon both went through three group stages to reach the main draw of the U13 Girls event, where both were defeated in the last 32 – Saunders having been 2-0 up against Mila Niu of Germany. Both then won their first positional play-off match in the 17th-32nd bracket, and both were then beaten by Emma Trascu of Hauts de France, before ending on winning notes as Lemmon finished 20th and Saunders 21st.