Under the guidance of Shirley Pickering, Knighton Park Table Tennis Club has a large coaching programme each year for young people with levels ranging from complete beginners up to County standard in various sessions during each week.

Something tried a year or so ago was a Child/Parent doubles event that was so popular that a repeat was demanded. Accordingly, 12 such pairs entered with a slight relaxing of the rules at times, not least of all for the absence of experience by the parent rather than the child. For many, doubles was an unknown quantity.

The three group winners contested the semi-finals whilst a best runner-up made up the four. Shiven and Ashish Arora progressed into the final with a four-game victory over Blayne and Tony Monteiro, while Corey and James Lancaster defeated best runners-up, Oscar and Steve Bentley.

The final proved to be a five-game cracker swinging one way then the other before the Lancasters finally emerged victorious, beating the Aroras 11-7 in the fifth. Requests for a repeat as soon as possible were immediately submitted to Club Secretary, Gordon Sanders.

* Park and Ride, by way of winning two keenly fought close encounters, have taken control of Group B in the Leicester League’s Elbow Tankard summer team handicap.

After defeating Vicars 12-8 they followed up with a nailbiting 11-9 success against club-mates, Park Keepers. Adam Green led the way with 4/6 while Jack Rogers won 3/4 and Max Huggins 3/6 while, for Keepers, Dean Jordan was on top form with 5/6. With the score 9-9 Green received 6 against Eddie Kwok in the decider, winning 21-19, 21-15.

Jordan also won five from six against Electric City in their previous match, with Rod Pickering taking 3/4 in a 12-8 victory for Keepers.

In Group A, KP Nutters went to the top with a 12-8 win over Knighton The Town thanks to an excellent match-winning maximum from Robert Geary with support from Steve Bessant at 2/4. For The Town Alec Downes typically battled all the way to win 3 from 6 with two of those defeats at deuce.