Business Houses’ Table Tennis champion craves stiffer competition

Singles champion and Most Valuable Player of the Scotia Bank Business Houses Table Tennis Tournament Alonzo Primus is encouraging the organisers to ease up on the restrictions.{{more}}

Primus pouched the titles last Saturday evening at the West St George Secondary School, with a 3-0 (11-7, 11-5, 11-8) thrashing of Davon Cato.

Whilst gleeful that he copped the major individual titles in the 2013 edition, Primus feels his win was too easy and has called for stiffer competition.

A former president of the St Vincent and the Grenadines Table Tennis Association, Primus advised: “It is a good tournament, but I would like to see more seasoned players get involved in the tournament …. I would like to see the involvement of the Police, the airport (E.T. Joshua), the Flour Mill and others”.

Primus also wants an ease on the rule which debars former and current national players from participating.

He said that it was incongruous not to allow players, who no longer represent St Vincent and the Grenadines and who have no intention of doing so again, to compete in the tournament, which is mainly geared for those who play casually.

Primus gave as an example former national player Khalique Bailey, as one such person.

In reaching the top of the heap, Primus, who turned 63 earlier this month, praised Bob Ballantyne for his coaching.

“… I must say thanks to my coach Bob Ballantyne, who helped me develop my loop, which I have been hard at practice for the last two years… Before that I never looped in all my life,” Primus admitted.

He noted that he was basically a “pusher”.

Primus revealed that he began playing the sport of table tennis at the age of 15, when he was a first grade teacher.

But he acknowledged that it was during his stint in the Royal St Vincent and the Grenadines Police Force that his interest grew.

Relishing his victory in the singles competition and also having played unbeaten in the teams’ competition, Primus said, “My biggest satisfaction is being number one”.

In the teams’ competition, Primus was part of the winning unit – Computec/Third Eye Security. (RT)