Rising star Vishnu Panchamukhi has qualified to represent Hertfordshire at the 47th Butterfly Schools’Individual Table Tennis Championships National Finals
Vishnu, who is 13 years old and attends Dame Alice Owens School in Potters Bar, will take on some of the best young players in the country at the Aldersley Leisure Village, Wolverhampton on Saturday April 2nd 2022.
He earned a place at the event by battling through county qualifying stages. The round stage consisted of 4 groups each with 5 players in. Vishnu topped his group to get through to the knockout stages.
Vishnu won semi-finals in the fifth and deciding game. The finals were even more tense and dramatic as Vishnu lost the first two games and in the third game Vishnu pulled back from match point for the opponent to win all the remaining three games and win the championship!
Vishnu took up table tennis in lockdown, playing on the dining table at home. He had to wait till after Covid to join a table tennis club. He now plays for Spins Table Tennis Academy. This is the 2nd tournament Vishnu has played in.
More than 350 players representing 50 counties will gather for the National Finals, which is the biggest one-day table tennis competition in the country. Several stars of the sport, including Rio Olympians Liam Pitchford, Paul Drinkall and Sam Walker and Commonwealth Games medallists Tin Tin Ho and Maria Tsaptsinos, competed at this event during their school years.
Competitions are held at Under 11, 13, 16 and 19 levels for both boys and girls. All primary and secondary schools are eligible to enter players in the county rounds in order to qualify for these national finals
Following these championships, the English Schools’ Table Tennis Committee will select representative teams to play in the Invitation International to be held in June 2022 with teams from England, Guernsey, Ireland, the Isle of Man, Scotland, and Wales all competing.