The club was formed around 1936 by the Carter brothers, using a school in Ellenborough Road, Wood Green, hence the unusual name.
Carter is a significant name in the clubs history. There were at least four Carter brothers, one of which, Roland, played Davis Cup tennis in 1946/47. Indeed our club was an offshoot ofthe original Ellenborough Tennis Club, now long gone.
Wilf Carter was probably the most important of the brothers, being Secretary/Treasurer for more than 25years and establishing the club in the early days of the North Middlesex Table Tennis League. An annual trophy is awarded to perpetuate his name. Incidentally one of our founder members, Tom Chapman, now a life member, is still in our midst. Tom pops up now and again at AGM’s and other functions. His most recent visit was in January 2007 at our official opening of our completely refurbished club house.
After the Second World War the club moved to the Bowes Pavilion at Tottenhall Sports Ground, Palmers Green. There is a photograph of some of the members in the bar, which will give you an idea of the rudimentary facilities compared to our existing building. Rapid expansion took place as the number of teams in the local league increased from five to twenty under the guidance of the then Secretary, Harold Webb and Chairman, David Hope. Then in September 1973, just two weeks before the new league season, the Bowes Pavilion was completely destroyed by fire. Nobody ever found out how or why, although the local authority had just finished re-wiring the pavilion!
However the club survived this traumatic period, eventually moving to a small hut on our present site, just big enough for two tables. Then fate took a hand and the next significant name in the clubs history “Oliver” crossed our path. It was the late Ken Oliver, then a director of Fairview Estates Ltd., along with Harold Webb and the members who masterminded the erection of a new building in 1976.
With support from the London Borough of Enfield and a grant from the then Sports Council, enough money was obtained for a purpose built table tennis clubhouse. The balance of funds was raised by a tremendous effort from the members. Then the present refurbished version of the club re-opened on 30th October 2006 funded by a grant from the Community Club Development Fund, the North Middlesex Table Tennis League and a significant contribution from the club. At the time of closure the membership stood at 141; three years later it is 300 and counting, demonstrating the enormous impact the modernized facility is having on the local community.
So from humble beginnings the club has progressed to its present status of Premier Club ‘Excellence’ and Premier Club ‘Ability’ Grade. The icing on the cake came in 2002 through a trio of achievements, one of which effectively made us the best sports club of any sport in the UK and a minority sport at that. From an entry of over 90 clubs representing over 50 sports,the Central Foundation for Sports and the Arts and the Council of Physical Recreation voted us “Sports Club of the Year 2002”. We also achieved first place in the English Table Tennis Associations Premier Club “Excellence” category “Club of the Year - 2002” and have been recognised as a Club of Excellence every year since 2003. Our Secretary Sylvia Tyler was also given the honour of beingthe ETTA’s “Volunteer of the Year - 2002”. In February 2003 the club was awarded the ETTA ‘Club Mark’ for Excellence (the first club at this level in England) – this is surely the highest achievable rank for any table tennis club within the ETTA Premier Club scheme. Not bad for a voluntary organisation which prides itself on being family friendly and one of the oldest and most respected clubs in the game.
“OUR CLUB” to 2010/11…………………
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.
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 was organised by Peter
Bussey and
the late Eddie Jones.
Local team competition in the
North Middlesex
League, and Cheshunt, 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.
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 or Hertfordshire 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 VIP's, members and friends and
are looking
forward to an 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, Local 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 informative and
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. |
