Team NUS stunned at SUNIG table tennis
BREAKING NEWS by Audrey Ang
20 September 2011
Despite being predicted as this year’s champions, the table tennis team from the National University of Singapore (NUS) experienced a shocking defeat, coming in 2nd last during the SUNIG Inter-varsity competition. This fall from their usual runners-up position was a bitter pill to swallow.
SUNIG table tennis is an annual competition that brings together Singapore’s four largest universities to compete against one another. Held at Nanyang Technological University (NTU), the competition was played round-robin style on the 17th of September.
NTU emerged champions, followed by SIM University while NUS and Singapore Management University (SMU) settled for the bottom two rungs.
The competition began with Team NUS beating Team SMU easily in all set games. Team NUS went on to face long-time rivals NTU in a classic fight which left NTU beating NUS by a fairly wide margin. Team NUS then proceeded to challenge Team SIM in the final battle for runners-up position.
Plagued by poor form, complacency and some bad luck, Team NUS lost 3 out of 4 set games to cede the runners-up title to underdogs SIM. This was despite a one set game walk-over given by Team SIM.
NUS Coach Lee Guo Bin blamed himself for the result.
“I laid out a bad line-up for the competition. We were definitely the better team.”
Lee made a hotly debated decision to play reserves instead of putting his top players in the game line-up. Consequently, Team NUS was arguably a slightly weakened force.
“It was a heavy burden to win all my games and it didn’t help that I was feeling really down and unconfident after losing against NTU. I guess I was just too preoccupied with focusing on my own weaknesses and the team’s, rather than the opponents’,” added Team NUS Captain Michelle Foo.
This was Team SIM’s first time securing a runners-up title, despite fielding an incomplete team.
“This is such an unexpected result! We came into the competition with an only 6 out of 7 players, but everyone really came in with the right attitude and we were well-rewarded,” added Team SIM Captain Leong Yuan Shan.
Apart from reflecting on the defeat, Team NUS will take action to ensure that such an upset will not occur again.
“We will definitely be training hard to take our game to the next level. We will be back!” says Michelle.
20 September 2011
Despite being predicted as this year’s champions, the table tennis team from the National University of Singapore (NUS) experienced a shocking defeat, coming in 2nd last during the SUNIG Inter-varsity competition. This fall from their usual runners-up position was a bitter pill to swallow.
SUNIG table tennis is an annual competition that brings together Singapore’s four largest universities to compete against one another. Held at Nanyang Technological University (NTU), the competition was played round-robin style on the 17th of September.
NTU emerged champions, followed by SIM University while NUS and Singapore Management University (SMU) settled for the bottom two rungs.
The competition began with Team NUS beating Team SMU easily in all set games. Team NUS went on to face long-time rivals NTU in a classic fight which left NTU beating NUS by a fairly wide margin. Team NUS then proceeded to challenge Team SIM in the final battle for runners-up position.
Plagued by poor form, complacency and some bad luck, Team NUS lost 3 out of 4 set games to cede the runners-up title to underdogs SIM. This was despite a one set game walk-over given by Team SIM.
NUS Coach Lee Guo Bin blamed himself for the result.
“I laid out a bad line-up for the competition. We were definitely the better team.”
Lee made a hotly debated decision to play reserves instead of putting his top players in the game line-up. Consequently, Team NUS was arguably a slightly weakened force.
“It was a heavy burden to win all my games and it didn’t help that I was feeling really down and unconfident after losing against NTU. I guess I was just too preoccupied with focusing on my own weaknesses and the team’s, rather than the opponents’,” added Team NUS Captain Michelle Foo.
This was Team SIM’s first time securing a runners-up title, despite fielding an incomplete team.
“This is such an unexpected result! We came into the competition with an only 6 out of 7 players, but everyone really came in with the right attitude and we were well-rewarded,” added Team SIM Captain Leong Yuan Shan.
Apart from reflecting on the defeat, Team NUS will take action to ensure that such an upset will not occur again.
“We will definitely be training hard to take our game to the next level. We will be back!” says Michelle.