English hopes were extinguished through a series of efficient displays by the world’s top players as any hopes of an English upset were brushed aside with clinical precision.

There was just one victory for an English player in Stockholm on day three of the ITTF Pro Tour in Sweden with Darius Knight progressing to round two of the boys under 21s with a win over Belgium’s Emillien Vanrossomme.

The rest of the day was always likely to be tough with seven senior singles matches involving opposition players ranked at 82 in the world or better.

In the end the English dreams were wiped away by a succession of powerful displays from their respective opponents with only six games being claimed by English players all day – three of those were in Knight’s under 21 victory.

Although a chastening experience it needs remembering that our chances were diminished from the start with top ranked players; Paul Drinkhall, Joanna Parker and Kelly Sibley, all not attending the event.

With Liam Pitchford also over-stretched having played in Poland, Germany and Sweden within a week it was always going to be a long-shot for any positive results.

Credit to those English players who did take part though and it says something about the growing optimism amongst the home nations that we had seven British players progress past the singles qualification rounds, even without our top stars in action.

We look ahead soon to the ITTF Pro Tour Grand Finals in London, which is the next stop for the world’s best players after Sweden. No doubt in London our players will be switched on and raring to cause a few shocks.

Selected day three results are listed below:

Men’s singles:

J Lundqvist (SWE, 54) bt A Baggaley 4-1 (11-6, 11-7, 7-11, 11-6, 11-7)

D Reed v D Eloi (FRA, 77) bt D Reed 4-1 (11-9, 9-11, 11-5, 11-9, 11-8)

Women’s singles:

S Hirano (JPN, 12) bt E Bates 4-0 (11-1, 11-5, 11-6, 11-9)

S Beibei (SIN, 20) bt H Hicks 4-0 (11-3, 11-4, 11-2, 11-7)

MY Choi (KOR, 82) bt A Loveridge 4-0 (11-6, 11-1, 11-6, 11-4)

JH Jeon (KOR, 27) bt N Liu 4-1 (11-7, 11-9, 11-13, 11-3, 11-3)

N Owen v W Jiaduo (GER, 17) bt N Owen 4-0 (11-6, 11-3, 11-1, 11-8)

Boys under 21s:

D Knight bt E Vanrossomme (BEL, 565) 3-2 (8-11, 11-7, 9-11, 11-6, 11-6)

S Gauzy (FRA, 216) bt D Knight 3-0 (11-9, 11-9, 17-15)

Girls under 21s:

MS Kang (KOR, 51) bt E Bates 3-0 (11-6, 11-7, 11-6)

K Kusinska (POL, 216) bt H Hicks 3-1 (10-12, 13-11, 11-9, 11-6)