The New Agenda

More places to play

For table tennis to expand its popularity, every area needs good, modern playing facilities, open on a daily basis. Unfortunately, these are not available in most areas. In one period just over a decade ago, we were opening a new centre almost every month. More recently, whilst new centres are being created, the rate has slowed down and the Development Department seem to have lost their focus on this priority. The National Facility Officer post, which is so vital and crucial in this programme, has not been replaced after the resignation of Paul Baker and has been left vacant for the last year.

ACTION
It will be my intention to prioritise “More Places to Play” and give every local league and club every assistance to find new or improve existing playing facilities.

We will immediately reinstate the National Facility Officer position and refocus the Regional Development Officers to prioritise help to our members.

Club facilities like those in Cippenham, Scarborough, Halton, Dewsbury, Draycott, Ellenborough and my own club at Ormesby, are clearly the way forward for the sport and my goal is to really make this happen everywhere that the local members are ready to play their part.

Grant aid service for leagues and clubs

In the 1990’s one of the services provided through the Development Department and the Regional Development Officers was a Grant Aid Service for leagues and clubs. In one season alone, more than £300,000 mainly in small grants was awarded to our member organisations.

I requested the current Management Committee through National Council to provide an up to date guide book for leagues and clubs needing small grants to be produced and distributed but, unfortunately, this was refused. Substantial grant aid is still available. My club, Ormesby, for example, enjoy between £5,000 and £10,000 each year from sources outside table tennis for projects that we promote.

ACTION
One of my first tasks after being elected would be to reintroduce a full Grant Aid assistance programme for our member leagues and clubs, researching all methods of funding and producing a leaflet explaining how these grants can be obtained. This would also be available on the website and heavily promoted so that our members are fully aware of the opportunities available to them. Assitance will be given by the Regional Development Officers where needed.

Progress in schools

I am delighted with the progress that has been made by John Arnold, the President of the English Schools’ Table Tennis Association, and our Chief Executive, Richard Yule, with the Youth Sports Trust and the programmes for expanding table tennis in schools. Table tennis is one of the first eight sports to be involved in this programme, which includes the appointment of Competition Managers in schools throughout most of England.

ACTION
This is a programme that we need to build on. However, to take full advantage of it the schools programme needs to be linked into our clubs and leagues that have the capacity to take new members. Special priority together with the English Schools TTA will be given by the Development Department to make this happen and help given to our member clubs to assist them to welcome the influx of keen youngsters.

Coaching review

I am concerned that the ETTA Coaching Scheme is not delivering the service that our coaches and players need. I was pleased to see that Sport England included table tennis in its club/coach programme which has placed a well funded coach in most of our Regions. Currently these coaches are concentrating on real grass roots programmes linked to a small number of Premier Clubs and, therefore, only servicing a very small percentage of our clubs and doing very little for the leagues.

Some other governing bodies supported by Sport England for this programme have been able to give their Regional Coaches a much wider remit allowing them to be more effective for a much larger proportion of their association members.

I am also concerned by the way that table tennis is tackling the change over from ETTA Coaching qualifications to the new UKCC. Although some courses have subsidised the cost of table tennis level 1 and 2 courses, the cost of the switch from ETTA to UKCC seems very high. We are also having much of our training of coaches undertaken by rugby coaches!

ACTION
I am confident that there is a much better way forward and after I have been elected I will undertake a full review of the Coaching Scheme with the objective of finding a much more productive way forward for our sport.

International events in england

It is disappointing to record that the last major table tennis event in England was in the Commonwealth Games in 2002. All we have had, have been Matthew Syed’s one day invitation events and the Junior/Cadet Europe Top 10 in Sheffield last year which was the wrong event at the worst time and cost ETTA funds an amazing £33,000. Other than the Junior/Cadet Europe Top 10, the ETTA have tried to bring three other international events to England over the last couple of years and have had to cancel all of them. We have had virtually no international matches and certainly no international tours to date. In my first six years in office 1991-1997 we held three full English Opens, the European Championships in Birmingham in 1994, the Olympic Qualification 1996 in Manchester and the full World Individual and Team Championships in Manchester in 1997 with the World Veterans the following year.

I was personally responsible for raising the funds for all of these events as well as being Chairman of the Organising Committees. Much of the £27million of new money that I brought to the sport in my last period in office was used to pay for these events. Some of it was obtained on the back of the Manchester Olympic Bid and the Commonwealth Games. With the budgets available to support the 2012 Olympic Games, funding should be obtainable for an event programme right now if we make the right approaches.

ACTION
Establish an International Event programme including World, European, Commonwealth and English Open events for the next 5 years and bring top quality international table tennis back to England on a regular basis.

Etta website

As modern technology has improved, so have websites of all kinds. The ETTA website provides a reasonable service but, in my view, it could be much, much better be far more informative and provide a comprehensive information service for our members. Some international events in which our players are representing England are missed altogether and others are only reported on when the event is underway without previews. More of our home events should be covered on the site – some are – but many more should be with an upto date result service from the venues.

ACTION
All of this is achievable – it just takes investment in equipment and people. I know how much a really good website would be appreciated by our members and would quickly take the steps needed to achieve this.

National team concerns

It has been good to follow the successes of our boys last year winning medals in World and European junior events. Congratulations to all concerned!

BUT WHAT ABOUT THE FUTURE? At this moment we have not benefited from the vast increase in funding provided to Olympic sports and may face a cut in the amount provided. Most of our current crop of top players, Paul Drinkhall, Darius Knight, Gavin Evans, Kelly Sibley, Joanna Parker, benefited greatly from the Nottingham Academy 1998 – 2003. For three years there was no academy, but for the last couple of years this group have benefited from the opening of the +16 Academy in Sheffield – but what about the next generation of players ?

The only player to win an individual event medal in a major junior event, other than those listed above, is Liam Pitchford whose home in Chesterfield is very near to the Sheffield Academy and he obviously benefits from living close to high quality practice and coaching.

For players who cannot play at Sheffield on a regular basis it is very difficult to see with the current arrangements how they can have the support to emulate the achievements of Paul Drinkhall. The European Junior/Cadet Top 10 tournament takes place in the Netherlands in February and we have only one player amongst the 40 competitors – Gavin Evans – no cadets, no girls.

ACTION
Take a fresh look with our top coaches to reassess what is needed to give our top youngsters a real chance again on the World stage and see how this can be provided.

We know that our most talented young players need to have 12/16 hours per week of quality practice, coaching and support services in addition to their competition programme if they are going to make the grade at international level. This happened in Nottingham and now for the local youngsters in Sheffield, but it needs to be available to more of our top young players if we are to succeed.

We also need to provide the support for our young senior squad to progress to 2012 and beyond.

With our current UK Sport funding status both of these maybe difficult, but we must find a way. Our players deserve it.

Better value for the licensed players

With approximately £300,000 going into ETTA funds from the licensed players in the way of entry fees and license fees, and the clubs that enter the British Leagues, I believe that there is scope for a better service being provided by the Association. The ETTA website, although improving, leaves much to be desired in terms of information and reports. Some competitions where the fees include the cost of providing qualified umpires end up with the players umpiring matches. The organisation of our last five Junior/Cadet and the National Under 14 Championships have been seriously “unsatisfactory”. I wrote a paper for National Council which Marketing Committee have accepted that the strong criticism was valid.

The calendar also could be much better . For the Juniors, for example, 5 or 6 of the top events are all sandwiched into the last few weeks of the season when many youngsters are in their exam period and whilst, on the other hand, there is a 2 or 3 month gap in the middle of the season with no key events at all. Last season the Women’s British league did not start until March and finished at the end of June due to calendar difficulties.

ACTION
I will put all this right and give a much better service and value for the licensed players and National League clubs. I will concentrate on producing a much better and informative website. Work hard with the National Umpires & Referees Committee to increase the number of umpires for ETTA events. Be more selective with venues and put common sense back into the arrangements for our Junior/Cadet/Under 14 Championships and the calendar of events.

Click here to read the relevant proposal

Umpires & referees

I am deeply concerned about the decline in numbers and availability of umpires for our events. It makes such a difference at British League and County matches, for example, to have qualified umpires available to conduct the matches rather than having players from either team to officiate. As the average age of our umpires is rising, this problem becomes more acute. I wrote a detailed set of proposals to address this problem for National Council several months ago. It was very well received by National Council and, in conjunction with the National Umpires and Referees Committee, Council agreed a way forward for the training and support for our officials.

Unfortunately the resources in manpower and finance have not been allocated to this plan to date so that little or no progress has been made.

ACTION
Implement the NURC/Ransome plan immediately as there is no time to be lost on this project.

Click here to read the relevant proposal

International representation

Although we have a member elected to the 50 strong ITTF Board of Directors and a number of people sit on various ITTF and ETTU committees, England have no member on the Executive Committee of either body and no committee chairmen, which is the weakest position we have had in the 80 year history of the sport. The only true decision making position that we hold as Chairman of the Commonwealth Table Tennis Federation, a role that I have held since 1993.

ACTION
Select English members who have real experience in their specialist fields in international table tennis and work with the decision makers in the ITTF and ETTU to have them elected to key influential positions.

Conflict of interest

When I was elected Chairman in 1991, my first task initiated in the period between the election results had been declared and my taking office three months later, was to establish a Trade Committee. With my company being in the supply of table tennis equipment I felt it was essential that systems and procedures were put in place to remove any scope for personal advantage.

The Trade Committee has been in place since 1991 and is satisfactorily fulfilling its function. The committee includes within its procedures Government, Sport England and UK Sport guidelines and its work is reviewed by Sport England as a routine part of their audit procedure. We will continue with the Trade Committee in its current format and ensure that any possibility for conflict of interest is removed. Follow to the letter the current ETTA Rules regarding Business Interest and Declaration of Interest as was the case in my last period in office.