Annual Report 12/13 - The English Table Tennis Association

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clubs and leagues, and the other
is the growing band of social/
recreational players, such as
those introduced to table tennis
through the advent of Ping!
1.5.6 Over the first three years of
Individual Membership, we sent
out around 80,000 membership
cards, using a personalised
card and letter. For the season
2013/2014 we will be moving
to a slightly different card, but
containing the same information.
The cards and associated letter
will be digitally printed from now
on, which brings two different
benefits. Firstly, the unit costs
are reduced and secondly, we
will be able to print cards in any
size of batches without impacting
the cost. This means that we will
now be able to get cards into the
hands of members more quickly
because of the digital process.
1.6 Player Licence Scheme
1.6.1 The figures for 2012/13 are:
Cadet Junior Senior Total
Player 865 432 1,158 2,455
1.7 Rules Committee
1.7.1 The main task of the Committee
this season was to prepare
proposals for changes to the
rules concerning affiliation, for
two reasons. The first proposed
change would adopt the principle
of a “Membership Year”, a
concept developed by the
Membership Committee to avoid
the anomaly whereby a player
affiliating in one year can continue
to play competitive table tennis
for several months of the following
year without paying a further fee.
The second proposed change
would bring the procedure for
notifying proposed affiliation fee
changes into line with that for
Rule Change Propositions and so
avoid the difficulties that arose in
2011/12.
1.7.2 As part of this revision, the
opportunity was taken to divide
the current rules on affiliation,
which are all in one section,
into three sections, covering
separately the affiliation of
organisations, the affiliation of
individuals and affiliation fees. It
is believed that this will make the
relevant rules easier to find. As
a further step in simplification,
proposals will be made to the
AGM to delete those sections
of the Company’s Articles of
Association, which relate to
the transfer of assets and
responsibilities from the former
ETTA to ETTA Limited in 2001,
which are now redundant.
1.7.3 Regulation changes agreed at
the 2012 British League and
County Championship Annual
Conferences were incorporated
in the appropriate Appendices,
and later in the season Regulation
Change Proposals for the 2013
Conferences were drafted
on behalf of the responsible
committees.
1.7.4 Advice on questions of rule
interpretation was given on
request to ETTA committees and
officials as well as to member
organisations and individuals.
1.8 Ranking Committee
1.8.1 The ranking process has once
again functioned admirably
despite pressures on the Ranking
team from Individual Membership.
1.8.2 Jennifer Sherwin and her
assistants performed admirably
as usual, and Carol Hackett has
seamlessly managed the switch
to her leadership on Jennifer’s
retirement.
1.8.3 The rate of error continues to be
extremely low considering the
volume of data to be manually
processed.
1.8.4 The process has continued of
importing results created for
the website into the Ranking
programme. All National
Championships and British
Leagues are processed this way.
1.8.5 Concerns are emerging on the
new ranking system as to its
implementation on a database
level and in the method of
allocating changes to ratings. The
parallel run is still pending.
1.8.6 The major reason for
implementation of the new
system has been removed with
the ranking system upgrade for
2012/13 in that:
a) Licence numbers are no longer
restricted to 4 numerics. They
can now be any number of
digits from 1 to 9 in length;
b) A separate cadet ranking list
has been implemented.
1.8.7 The policy to aid competitiveness
by reducing ranking points by
10% each season seems to be
having the desired effect and will
continue.
1.9 Organisations in Good
Standing
1.9.1 The following organisations have
been in Good Standing for the last
year:
• Royal Air Force TTA
• British Table Tennis Association
for People with Disabilities
• English Schools’ Table Tennis
Association
• Ambition (formerly ‘Clubs for
Young People)
• Elite Hardbat Competition
• Lancashire and Cheshire TTL
• Maccabi GB Table Tennis
• Police Sport UK Indoor Sports
Section
• Royal Navy TTA
• UK Deaf TTA
• Veterans’ English Table Tennis
Society
• British Universities and Colleges
Sports
1.10 Obituaries
1.10.1 The following friends and
colleagues have died during the
past year:
• Keith Ponting: President of
ETTA, Honorary Life Member
1983, former Management
Board member and member of
the National Team Competitions
and British League Committees
for many years. Also was
President, General Secretary
and National Councillor for
Devon County TTA.
• RE (Bob) Griffin: Vice-President
of Gloucestershire County
TTA and a former international
player.
• Les Jones: Level 3 Coach in
the North West.
• Jack Reeves: Life Member,
past President, Chairman
and Vice-Chairman of the
Gloucestershire County TTA.
• Les D’Arcy: Well known player
in the Veterans’ English Table
Tennis Society.
• Phil Gower: President of
Essex County TTA and former
Chairman and Secretary.
Qualified as an International
Umpire and International
Referee.
• Stephen Chambers: UKCC
Level 2 Coach.
• Ken Stanley: Former England
International Player.