Coaching clinics boost table tennis wins

The men’s national table tennis team walked away with two wins during their participation at the World Team Table Tennis Championships which were held from the 28th of April to the 6th of May in Tokyo, Japan.
The quartet of Heiko Fleidi, Fabian Tait, Reinhardt Stanley and Darren Strauss represented the country at the event.
“We can be happy with the results as we exceeded the objective we set ourselves. This can be directly attributed to the coaching clinics by international coaches just prior to departing for Tokyo, Japan,” said Team Captain Heiko Fleidi.
Despite all their efforts the team faced very stiff competition in their category 5 which usually caters for countries that play table tennis at amateur level.

During the preliminary round of Group Q, the boys squared of with Maldives, Libya, Palestine and Malta. The team managed to finish ahead of Liberia during the play-offs by default and then went on to thrash the Guam Islands 3-0 during the final positional play-offs.
Fleidi said, “It was a great experience for each and every one, but we realized that we are not good enough yet and a lot of work has to be done in the future. We lacked the final edge in most of the games.”
“The benefits from the short-term coaching were evident and the Namibian Table Tennis Association (NTTA) will now focus on the appointment of a long-term coach. We are in contact with a possible partner in this regard and if everything goes according to plan we will have a coach by the end of the year,” he added.
The appointment of a coach will prove to be a vital step in the preparation for the team for the Zone6 (2015) and the rolling out of table tennis to all the corners of the country by the end of the year.