Welcome to the ETTC web site. Here you will find the the latest information concerning one of the premier Table Tennis clubs in London..
Ellenborough extends a warm welcome to everyone who comes through its doors, be they young or old and is especially keen to welcome colleagues from abroad. The early days of the club, and its history, David has related in his “Message from the Chairman”. Being the biggest and most successful club in the North Middlesex League for many years, with ideal playing conditions, Ellenborough quickly rose to National prominence.
As a founder member club of the National
League in the eighties, we became champions of the Premier Division
three times
in five seasons, with such players as Graham Sandley, Colin Wilson,
John
Kitchener, David Tan, Nigel Tyler and Mark Mitchell.
The Ladies trio of Angela Mitchell, Helen
Williams and Lesley Tyler were champions of Great Britain and reached
the
semi-final of the European Cup - losing to the eventual winners from
Hungary. Almost all these players
lived
locally, and the club was sponsored by Thorn EMI who provided most of
the
finance for these ventures. Coach Lloyd
Lewis was mainly responsible for these successes and in those days
general
coaching responsibilities for the juniors were organised by Peter
Bussey and
the late Eddie Jones.
When Thorn EMI decided to cease their sponsorship and some of our players, with their families moved away, we ran a Men’s British League team in Divn. 3 South with Jimmy Walsh as captain still with home-grown players. This team rose to Divn.2 and with added strength from outside finished runners up in Divn.1 South in 2003/4. They are now well established in the prestigious Premier Divn. finishing 2005/6 in the top half of the Premier division and 2nd in 2008/9. We sport a 2nd Men’s British League team in Divn. 3 South, our top juniors play in this League. We have Ellenborough teams in the Women’s British League and both Men’s and Ladies Veterans British Leagues but not currently. In the Junior British League we have 1 new boys’ teams and one girls team in Divn3.
Local team competition in the Nth.Middx. League Cheshunt, Barnet and Shaw Leagues are available. During the playing season there are plenty of members practising regularly and during the Summer months June to September we run a handicap competition and Summer League.
In the last few years due to the efforts of Terry Wilson, Nick McKoy Snr, Sylvia Tyler and other coaching staff, a new crop of juniors have emerged who are beginning to make their presence felt. Many of these new players have joined the club through the courses initiated by the London Borough of Enfield which have been held at the club during school holidays, producing a remarkable increase in membership. We now run junior sessions of coaching for all ages from 5yrs-18yrs – sometime 30 plus juniors attend. 2 sessions are for our advanced coaching group. In 2009 we welcomed Urban Progress Pro Table Tennis Club to our ranks to assist our coaching programme for all categories of players.
Our juniors participate in the London Jun. TT Scheme – which introduces beginner /improvers to competition. We enter teams in the National Junior League (U’18s) and National Cadet League (U’15s), these compete with other London Clubs for National recognition. Our venue is used for the North London Zone event. Some of our juniors have represented the London Region Team and our players are prominent in the English Schools National event each year. Our best juniors represent their County Middlesex and are encouraged to enter individual tournaments at National level to improve their match play. We are ever grateful for the support of our junior parents, we know they appreciate all the competitions we make available, but often these could not be fulfilled without their help – they are invaluable.
A number of our members both young and old compete in individual tournaments Nationally and some visit foreign parts annually playing in World and European Veterans Championships.
We have a very comprehensive Development Plan – we achieve and are a recognised “Premier Club of Excellence” standard, the highest possible category and now have Club Chartermark status. We, as one of the “pilot” Premier Ability Clubs, ran disabled sessions regularly for 2 years as “Ellenborough Eagles” which is now integrated into our regular coaching sessions. We have an Over 50 group – holding 3 regular group sessions weekly.
We are a “hub club” for smaller table tennis clubs in Enfield. We are linked closely with a number of schools and our coaches have assisted in the schools’ curriculum programme. We have always worked in tandem with Enfield Council and the community of Enfield as a whole. In March 2004 we ran an ETTA Coaching Course for both Level 1 and Level 2. Enfield Council’s Sports Development Team have expressed interest in organizing regular courses in the future and we will co-operate.
During the summer of 2006 we “closed” to extend our premises. We hired an alternative venue for the whole of the summer to enable our members to continue practising. The extension has given us a larger playing area and facilities have been upgraded to include new toilet suites, larger changing rooms, a committee room, an office, storage space and a revamped entrance hall and social area, which will be disabled friendly – at last we will be able to welcome disabled players with full facilities. The club has been consulting with Paul Baker (ETTA Facilities Development Officer) and Sport England UK. Our phase two is to build another hall on to this extended building, we already have planning permission, but not the funds to make this happen immediately. This will increase our ability to stage matches and events, and to expand our existing commitments under the ETTA’s Premier Excellence” programme. We re-opened in October 2006 and are hoping to exceed our current membership of 200 in the future. We have now had an official opening event in January 2007 inviting the Borough of Enfield’s Mayor and Mayoress, Councillors, ETTA representatives and other VIPs, members and friends and are looking forward to and even brighter future, with many more achievements for the club. Since our reopening we are taking part in new initiatives put to us by the ETTA in coaching, holding regular coaching courses and linking with local schools.
We write regular articles with photographs in Everyone’s a Winner monthly (a colour illustrated magazine for Youth Sport in Enfield) this has an enormous circulation throughout the Borough and into the schools. We have our own web site www.ellenboroughttc.com which is updated with the latest news and accomplishments. We advertise in libraries, schools, Council Offices Directories and free-bee papers. We have a newsletter circulated to all our membership four times a year. We have an illustrated 1 page flyer and a Club Prospectus for new members. Our notice boards are informativeand attractive to visitors and members, and constantly updated.
We welcome the Mayor and other VIPs to an “Annual Junior Open Morning” in June. We run our own Club Closed tournament each year. We also have our own designated club kit.
The General Committee of Ellenborough consists solely of voluntary people, but their enthusiasm for the sport they love is second to none. We have made tremendous strides forward in the last three seasons, being successful in all our ventures but always seeking to achieve more and reach greater heights and excellence.
NOW to the future Following the refurbishment, a tremendous amount of work has been done raising funds through grants available to us, this has helped to keep us solvent during these difficult early years in our new building. Our membership has increased to 300 and is still increasing. We are now partners in the Jack Petchey Award Scheme, which is targeted at our ever-expanding junior section and benefits the club as a whole. We are looking ahead and hoping for a new, younger Committee to take over in the future and build on the success of the past.
SYLVIA TYLER - General Secretary