Mark O'Flynn acquitted himself well as part of the cadet boys team at the European Youth Championships in spite of misleading and spiteful comments made on other websites. Unfortunately,the team finished last although they won a match and were not the worst team there. In addition the two players showed a dedicated, professional approach and team spirit not displayed by many Irish teams over the years at this event.
All of this makes it all the more annoying for Mark to read the negative and ill informed comments made about the team. No one could have put more effort in than these two. They practiced every day in the months leading up to the event and gave up an amazing amount of their "spare " time to the sport. They face huge obstacles in the shape of quality practice and opportunity for International competition. In spite of that they were always good humoured and enthusiastic and even at the championships when a lesser person might have crumbled in the face of defeat they kept going.
Mark and Keith Knox from Trillick had a tough schedule for young players. On day one they faced three matches. They were one of about four teams out of 140 or so teams to have three matches on day one. They lost all of them 3-0 but there were close matches with Keith taking an end off the Spanish number one. Other than the Spanish, the teams were not the strongest but it was difficult on their first day to face such a punishing schedule. The following day they faced Kosovo and beat them 3-0 in impressive style. Although the Kosovo team were weaker than the others in the group the match still had to be won and I have seen these matches lost in the past.
Again they were handed another punishing schedule for the second phase. Three matches again on one day! I complained to the tournament referee but to no avail. They played really well in this phase and having got used to the pace of the championships were unlucky not to beat Estonia who had many good wins at the championships. They lost 3-1 with Mark taking an end from the number one and Keith winning his second singles. They also lost 3-1 to Bulgaria where they fought back in the doubles from 2-0 down to win deuce in the fifth. Mark played well in the match against Wales where he fought back from 2-0 down to David Owen to level the match at 2 all with some superb table tennis before losing out in the fifth. How difficult this competition is can be seen from Wales who finished 37th even though David Owen won 10 singles!
This meant that they had a two day period without a match but they spent all that time in the practice hall working on their play or in the competition hall trying to learn by watching the best players in Europe. Overall you could not fault the performance of the players. They gave their all and if that was not quite good enough on this occasion it was not for want of effort or dedication on their part. They both can improve as players and have to do so to compete at this level, but with Mark still a cadet next season and Keith heading out for a month's training after the Championships, I have every confidence that they have the ability to learn from this experience and develop into very good players.