Players from as far as Newcastle under Lyme and Nottingham travelled to the Britannia Table Tennis Club in Ipswich to play in the fourth Britannia Senior Super Series of the season.

Offering national ranking points and a total of £310 for the overall winner and runner-up, the games were keenly contested.

With Chris Doran, the current Grand Prix series champion, seeded No 1 and hot favourite it was thought that the two new players to this event, Ismaila Akindiya and Adeoye Adewale, seeded two and three would provide the best opposition.

In stage one, players played in round-robin groups to determine qualification for either band one or two.

In group two Matthew Currant beat higher seed Ryan Moore to progress into band one, while Akindiya won all his games. In group four another seeding upset saw Lee McHugh beat Helmuth Osbourne to qualify with unbeaten group winner Richard Hutchinson for band one.

In group five, Yao Li beat the higher-seeded Victor Chan to qualify for band one and took group winner Andrew Dosher to five sets. Group six saw one of the best victories of the day when Alex Aston came from 0-2 down to beat the exciting Lewis Carby, who has over 300 more ranking points, this match decided the first and second place.

After the second section, four players progressed to the band one semi-finals. Doran took on Suffolk’s Richard Hutchinson and Hutchinson got very respectable scores but lost 3-0. In the second semi-final, Akindiya and Adewale showed their attack-minded games to the spectators and it proved to be a seeding upset as Adewale emerged to the final with a 3-1 victory.

The final was a decent spectacle but Doran was always comfortable, taking the match 3-0. However, the game was memorable for not only a shot of the season but perhaps a candidate for shot of the decade when Doran allowed his opponent’s shot to drop down below him to play a bending shot that curved up and on to the table round the net amidst rapturous applause from the audience. Like Gavin Rumgay before him, Doran is unbeaten at Britannia Table Tennis Club.

Watch the final below – the ‘shot of the decade’ is after 6min 40sec.

Results

Band one
Semi-finals
Chris Doran beat Richard Hutchinson 3-0 (11-6, 11-6, 11-9)
Adeoye Adewale beat Ismaila Akindiya 3-1 (11-4, 9-11, 11-8, 11-5)
Final
Doran beat Adewale 3-0 (11-7, 11-8, 11-7)

3rd-4th play-off: Ismaila Akindiya beat Richard Hutchinson 3-1 (9-11, 11-6, 11-7, 11-4)
5th-6th play-off: Lewis Carby beat Christopher Cockburn 3-0 (11-6, 11-5, 14-12)
7th-8th play-off: Stephen Clubb beat Matthew Currant 3-2 (3-11, 11-8, 14-12, 9-11, 17-15)
9th-10th play-off: Alex Aston beat Lee Mchugh 3-1 (5-11, 11-5, 11-4, 11-5)
11th-12th play-off: Andrew Dosher beat Yan Li 3-1 (11-2, 6-11, 11-9, 11-6)

Band two
13th-14th play-off: Curtis Beales beat Paul Waity 3-2 (11-8, 13-11, 9-11, 7-11, 11-6)
15th-16th play-off: Ryan Moore beat David Gatheral 3-0 (11-7, 11-7, 11-8)
17th-18th play-off: Helmuth Osbourne beat Antonio Beckles 3-0 (11-4,12-10, 12-10)
19th-20th play-off: Scott Morgan v Victor Chan W/O
21st: Paul Nicol