The inaugural Halifax Charitable Trust Junior Table Tennis Trophy tournament was held at Bishop Wilton Village Hall. Lady Halifax and Lord Halifax were guests of honour at the tournament.
Bugthorpe CE Primary School A Team, Ewen Braun and Askar Smith, were crowned champions. In a close and entertaining final, they defeated James Thompson and Rory Johnston of Sutton upon Derwent CE Primary School.
Other primary schools participating were Bishop Wilton and St Martins (Fangfoss).
In a subsidiary competition, the Over-11s Tournament was won by Niall Ferguson and Jacob Payne of the Ryedale Table Tennis League, who defeated the Woldgate School team of Oscar Pullen and Orson Innes. Woldgate School also received an award for the tournament’s most sporting team.
All participants received a certificate of achievement for outstanding skill and sportsmanship in table tennis. These were presented, together with the trophies and medals, by Lady Halifax.
The support of the Halifax Charitable Trust has been invaluable in enabling Bishop Wilton Table Tennis Club Chair Tony Fuller to coach the Table Tennis England TT Kidz programme in the primary schools of Amotherby, Bishop Wilton, Bugthorpe, St Martins (Fangfoss) and Sutton upon Derwent.
In the past 12 months this has benefited more than 130 children attending the aforementioned schools and provided the platform for the present tournament.
In her speech, Lady Halifax recognised the wonderful turnout and the joy each and every child from all the schools were having due to being introduced to table tennis through the TT Kidz coaching programme and through Bishop Wilton Table Tennis Club.