Triple silver for TT table tennis teams

TRINIDAD and Tobago’s table tennis players continued their impressive run yesterday bagging three silver medals at the  47th Caribbean Championships currently underway in Kingston, Jamaica.

The men’s doubles, women’s doubles and mixed doubles teams all qualified for their respective finals but were bettered by the rampant Dominican Republic players who are the dominant force at this year’s championships. In the men’s doubles  France-based professional Dexter St Louis and Anthony Brown beat Puerto Rico’s Coste Santiago and Juan Reveles in the semi-finals 11-5, 2-10, 13-11, 12-10. In the other half of the draw, the Dominican Republic pair of Lin Ju and Roberto Brito scored a hard-fought victory against Barbadians Robert Roberts and Trevor Farley 6-11, 11-6, 9-11, 11-8, 7-11. Lin Ju is a recent Pan Am Games singles gold medallist while Brito was runner-up last year at the Caribbean Championships.

In the final St Louis and Brown drew first blood winning the first game 11-6, lost the second 6-11, won the third 11-7 but conceded defeat in the final two 4-11, 4-11. In the mixed doubles competition, TT’s St Louis and his talented stepdaughter Rae-Ann Chung who also plays for Bordeaux in France beat the Dominican Republic’s second pair of Roberto Brito and Olga Villa 11-9, 8-11, 11-6, 11-6. This set up a fight for the gold medal against the DR’s top pair of Lin Ju and Wu Xue who swept past Barbados’ Trevor Farley and Ann Reid 11-7, 11-5, 11-6 in their semi-final match-up. But in the final St Louis and Chung had no answer to the ex-Chinese nationals capitulating at 9, 3, 8 to claim the silver medal. In the women’s doubles, Chung and Shelly-Ann Parris gave an outstanding performance in their semi-final against Barbados, literally bringing down the University of Science and Technology venue in what has been dubbed the “match of the tournament.” Parris and Chung lost the first two games but bounced back to oust Crystal Harvey and Sabrina Worrell 7-11, 3-11, 11-3, 11-8, 19-17.

In the final Chung and Parris were overwhelmed by Dominican Republic’s Wu Xue and Olga Villa 11-6, 11-7, 11-1 for the silver medal. In their half of the draw Wu Xue and Villa beat the Venezuelan pair of Yamileth Arasme and Mata 11-6, 11-3, 11-9. Yesterday Stanley Hunte, president of the Table Tennis Association and delegate at the Caribbean Championships said the TT players once again rose to the occasion and performed to the best of their ability. He said the singles competition is already underway and St Louis is the only player standing in the way of the Dominican Republic’s Wu Xue who is the Pan gold medallist and holds a world ranking. Hunte said a measure of the player’s calibre is his recent performance against world champion Pimo Boll whom he took two games off but lost 4-2 at the World Championships. Yesterday the women were playing in seven groups of four and were expected to whittle down to the last 16. The men however are playing in 13 groups of four and would go down to the last 32. Hunte also revealed that TT have offered to host the secretariat of the Caribbean Table Tennis Federation which is currently based in Barbados. A decision was to be made last night.