While all eyes will undoubtedly be on the Premier League this weekend as Fernando Torres’s old club takes on his new club at Stamford Bridge, there will be another reason to focus attention on the capital’s sporting events – and it has the backing of Arsenal legend Nigel Winterburn.
Saturday morning will see the Fred Perry Table Tennis Urban Cup 2011 reach its crescendo. But this is a football website, I hear you ponder. It is, and while the sport being played at London’s Business Design Centre in Islington will involve tables rather than turf, football will be well represented on the day.
The competition is the result of a collaboration between the English Table Tennis Association (ETTA), Sport England’s Sportsmatch initiative and the Premier League 4 Sports (PL4S) campaign. Over 100,000 youngsters aged 11-14 representing all 20 of the Premier League’s clubs have been taking part in the tournament over the past year and on Saturday, a winner will finally be crowned.
Former Arsenal defender Nigel Winterburn, who has been backing the campaign at the Emirates Stadium this week, says: “When you look back at what the Premier League clubs have done, with the sponsorship of Fred Perry, the community and the initiative of the clubs, it does unbelievable things not only for the sport but also for the kids playing it. A lot of kids have maybe not even thought about table tennis.”
Winterburn, who won the Double under manager Arsene Wenger, has always been a fan of the sport and has a table tennis table at home today. He says: “Obviously I played a team sport, so I love looking at the individual sports and at how someone pits themselves against somebody else, not only through their talent but their mental strength.”
Also backing the initiative is Darius Knight, a 20-year-old British table tennis star and 2012 Olympic hopeful. He says that a lack of funding in the sport is what is holding it back: “With the recession and all the financial problems, they’ve had to cut a lot of the funding and table tennis is one of the sports that got cut massively so it’s been quite difficult financially. I can still do it, don’t get me wrong, but it’s a bit more of a struggle. For England in table tennis there’s only one me but if there was the funding and support, there’d be twenty of me.”
If you fancy getting yourself down there to support your team (the youngsters will be in club colours), the finals of the Fred Perry Table Tennis Urban Cup 2011 will be held at the Business Design Centre on Upper Street in Islington, between 11am and 5pm on Saturday 5th February.
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