New Rankings Information

The new rankings were published today and Maria moved from being 6th Junior Girl with 1841 points to the 4th position with 2129 points and from the 18th position (2407 points) for Senior Women to the 16th position with 2524 points.

The following tournaments, that Maria participated, were taken into consideration

Polish Open – Hungarian Junior Open
Junior National Championships
Women's Premier British League
Junior Premier British League

More photos from the nationals

Courtesy of Alan Man and Andy Mintram

Doubles with Tin Tin Ho

Doubles Presentation with Tin Tin

Semi Finalists (Singles) with Lois Peake

Celebrating with Tin Tin at the end of the final

Action shot semi final singles against Emily Bates

Air Maria!

Doubles Final hugs with Tin Tin

Junior nationals

Competing at Hatfield on Saturday the 24th Maria had another good weekend with the pinnacle being the national title for the girls doubles partnering Tin Tin Ho. This was done in some style recording four straight 3-0 wins.
Won against Aydin and Tofalides 11-9 11-4 11-3, then against Forster and Davidson 11-5 11-2 11-8, followed by a 11-5 11-6 12-10 against Ashley and Gibson and in the final they beat Bates and Knowles 11-8 11-5 11-5. The team was coached by Brian Halliday who has overseen all Maria's national triumphs the past 18 months.

For the singles Maria was seeded number five and she went through the group stages with another three straight wins against Davidson (11-3 11-5 11-4), Gray (11-1 11-6 11-7) and Aydin (11-4 11-7 11-5). At the next round she faced McMullan and despite dropping a set she won 3-1 (11-3 11-2 7-11 11-4). At the quarter finals a very difficult game was waiting against Vicky Smith that Maria had never beaten before. At that stage the target as set by her seeding was met and everything else would had been a bonus.
After taking a two set lead both with the same score 11-9, Vicky came back to make it two all with the same score 11-6. At the deciding game Vicky was 7-4 up but then Maria rallied to win 11-8.
Next round, the semi final, Maria was to face Emily Bates yet another player she had never beaten before. Emily highly experienced in England and in Europe and with many national titles under her belt looked a very difficult prospect to beat. Maria took the first set in a very convincing manner 11-5 and she was leading for the second set 10-8 but Emily did not give up and she came back to win it 10-12. The third set went Emily's way with 9-11 and Maria responded with her own 11-9 win at the fourth set. At the deciding game Maria had three chances to reach the final when she had game points at 11-9, 11-10 and 12-11 but she did not take them and Emily took her own chance to win 12-14. The performance of Maria was probably the best of the day playing a player with not only vast experience but in a style that one might call awkward.

For the mixed doubles Maria and her partner Liam Mctiernan were eliminated in the first round by Danny Lawrence and Emily Bolton (9-11 9-11 7-11)

Junior Nationals Preview

This coming Saturday the junior nationals are taking place at Hatfield.
Maria is participating in three events: singles, doubles and mixed doubles.
For the singles she is seed 5 and at the group stages she will face Daniela Gray, Eleanor Davidson, Eda Aydib and Rebekkah Lycett.
For the doubles Maria and Tin Tin Ho have been seeded number one and in the first round they face Eda Aydin and Sophie Tofalides.
In mixed doubles Maria and her partner Liam McTiernan face Danny Lawrence and Emily Bolton.

Maria too hot to handle

Read here http://www.tabletennis365.com/wbl/news/1636 the interview Maria gave to the women's British league website.

Women's British League Sunday

The team continued their excellent run with two further wins against Sportingbet Guernsey and Thorntons TT 5-1 and 6-0 respectively.

Maria's results against Guernsey were:

A win against Kay Chivers 11-8 11-7 11-7 and a win against Dawn Morgan. 11-5 10-12 11-7 11-8.

Maria's results against Thornton were:

A win against Lisa Radford 11-5 11-8 9-11 11-3 and a win against Liz May 11-5 11-8 11-7.

The team was awarded the Team of the weekend honour.

Women's British League - Saturday

Maria was asked to join the Ormesby team for her debut at the women's British league premier division. The team consists of Chloe Whyte, Karen Shepherd and Maria.

The day finished with the team beating 6-0 Burton Uxbridge, 4-2 Halton Ttc1 and with the same score Draycott and Long Eaton.

Maria has a 100% record, translated into 6 wins out of 6. Her scores were as follows:

Against Burton Uxbridge
Won against Helen Turner 3-0 (11-5 11-4 11-5)
Won against Sophie Neil 3-1 (9-11 14-12 11-2 11-5)

Against Halton TTC1
Won against Fiona Dennet 3-0 (11-4 11-7 11-2)
Won against Angharad Phillips 3-0 (11-7 11-8 12-10)

Against Draycott and Long Eaton
Won against Sarra Wang 3-2 (11-3 9-11 11-8 8-11 12-10)
Won against Jessica Dawson 3-0 (11-4 11-8 11-7)

Hungarian Open: Singles Day 2

Following yesterday's win Maria this morning beat Chloe Thomas from Wales 3-0 (11-4, 11-8, 11-6). The next and final qualifying game is later today (1:25 UK time) against the Dutch girl. She lost 11-5 11-5 11-9 to the Dutch girl but her second position n the group gave her a spot at the main draw.

At the main draw Maria lost to Linda Bergstrom from Sweden 4-0 (5-11, 5-11, 8-11, 8-11).

Maria was the 14th youngest player in her first european tournament for Junior girls and hopefully the experience will benefit her for the forthcoming ones.

Hungarian Open Singles

Today Maria has started competing for the Hungarian Open Singles. For her qualifying group (group 18) Maria ranked 77th (out of 93) she has to face Ingrida Preidziute (Lithuania, ranked 38th ), Chloe Thomas (Walses, ranked 76th) and Alice Barendrest (Netherlands, ranked 34th ). For the first game she defeated Ingrida 3-0 (11-7 11-8 11-7) with the next two games scheduled for tomorrow.

Hungary Junior Updates

Maria arrived safely in Hungary to represent England at the Junior Level. Unfortunately she is the only girl since Tessa and Jessica dropped out because of injuries. Fortunately, Maria will be able to take part at the team event as a member of a mixed team from England and Canada. The games start today and the team has to face Chinese Taipei A and Slovakia A. A difficult draw!
Results will start appearing here

Filming with the BBC

With Richard Wisker presenter of Friday Download

Maria spent three hours today filming for the Friday Download BBC programme together with fellow players Michael Ho and Chris Doran. This episode will be shown sometime in November and introduces table tennis to the audience.

A great experience!

The crew in action

Being interviewed

with Chris and Michael

Lots of smoke and lights!

The English Table Tennis Association International Selection

Maria has been invited for the 2012 Hungarian Junior Open commencing on the 8th of November. Considering this is her first year as a junior this has come as a pleasant surprise and on the other hand it feels like a reward for an excellent season she had last year.
The following link provides further information:

Weekend treble international selections — The English Table Tennis Association

Junior British League: Day Two

St Andrews faced Burton Uxbridge 1 and the Irish team today.

Maria won her first game against Isobel Ashley 3-0 (11-1 11-2 11-8). Despite having a match point on the fourth set Maria lost 3-2 to Vicky Smith (10-12 11-9 11-8 10-12 6-11). Unfortunately this was the only win for the team, losing 5-1.

The Irish team drew with St Andrews 3-3 with Maria losing the first game to Ashley Givan 3-0 (7-11  9-11 9-11 ) and winning against Hannah Lynch-Dawson 3-0 (11-6 11-1 11-5).

All Maria's statistics here Overall for the first weekend Maria had 7 wins out of 10 matches with the team finishing joint third. Here is to the next weekend in February 2013.

With Terry Dean

Junior British League: Results up to now

The first weekend of the Junior British League is taking place this weekend at Tipton Academy. Maria represents St Andrews team with Letitia McMullan and Naomi Jackson. Naomi was a last minute replacement for Lois Peake who unfortunately still has shoulder problems.

The first game was against Northfield Girls and St Andrews lost 4-2.
Maria beat Jessica Dawson 3-0 (11-7 12-10 11-8) and lost to Emily Bates on the fifth (8-11, 13-11, 11-3, 10-12, 5-11).

The second game was against the Welsh team. St Andrews won 4-2 with Maria being victorious against Nicole Hall and Charlotte Carey with the same score, 3-2. Against Nicole the scores were 11-6, 6-11, 11-4, 7-11, 11-9. Against Charlotte the scores were 11-8, 7-11, 11-9, 7-11, 11-8.

For the third game against Burton Uxbridge 2 St Andrews came top with a clean sheet, 6-0. Maria  contributed two wins and retired to the hotel with a very bad headache. The two wins were against Lucy Zhu (5-11 11-8 11-9 11-4)  and Nicole Finn (9-11 11-7 11-8 11-6)  with the same score 3-1.

Great leap at the rankings

Maria's performance at the Guildford grand prix accumulated enough points to move her to the 21st position for senior women in England.

Hot and Cold at Sussex 4*

Following the brilliant performance at the Guildford Grand Prix Maria was disappointed with her results at the weekend at K2 Crawley, West Sussex. Two semi final loses on the fifth!

For the Junior Girls Singles Maria had two 3-0 wins at the group stage against Shannon Conway (11-2 11-6 11-4) and Naomi Jackson (11-8 11-6 11-8), a 3-1 win against Lucy Zhu at the Quarter Final stage (11-7 13-15 11-6 11-8) and lost 3-2 to Tressa Armitage on the fifth (9-11, 12-10, 11-13, 11-7, 7-11).

For theJunior Girls Band 1 Maria had two 3-0 wins at the group stage against Ella Patel (11-9 11-8 11-5) and Lucy Zhu (11-9 11-2 11-5), a Quarter Final win against Naomi Jackson (11-3 11-4 11-2) and then lost on another five setter to the eventual winner Yuki Wat (4-11 11-9 11-7 9-11 9-11).

Bribar Guildford Grand Prix Gallery of Photos (courtesy of Michael Loveder)

Guildford Grand Prix: Sunday Results

Maria's Saturday tremendous performance continued on Sunday when she reached the final of the Women's Singles. She topped her group with four notable wins as follows:
bt Angharad Phillips 11-6 11-7 11-8
bt Sue Collier 4-11 11-3 7-11 11-8 11-8
bt Sophie Neil 7-11 11-6 13-11 11-2
bt Sarah Hornsell 11-5 11-9 6-11 11-6

At the Quarter Final stage she faced Chloe Thomas from Wales and despite that she found herself 7-0 down at the first set she eventually won by 3 sets to 0 (11-7 11-6 11-7). At the Semi Final stage another Welsh player was beaten, Megan Phillips at a close game by 3 sets to 2 (7-11 11-9 7-11 11-7 12-10).

At the Final Hannah Hicks the number 3 senior English player managed to inflict the first defeat of the weekend by 3-1 (3-11, 11-8 8-11 3-11).


Maria at the end of the weekend was also awarded the Player of the Tournament.

Under the eagle eye of dad

Having fun with Nicole Hall

New season Good start

Band 3 Presentation

Band 2 Presentation

Maria's competitive season started with the Guildford grand prix, with two titles for women's band 2 and 3.
Women's Band 2
Group Stage
bt Nicole Hall: 12-10 11-8 11-7
bt Gosia Muda 11-6 11-9 11-6
bt Diane McLellan 11-4 11-2 11-5
bt Feifei Pei 11-5 10-12 11-5 11-8
bt Jasmin Ould 13-11 7-11 11-5 11-7

Semi Final
bt Ikue Humphrey 11-6 5-11 11-8 11-7

Final
bt Jasmin Ould 11-6 12-10 11-3

Band 2 Final shot

Women's Band 3
Group Stage
bt Diane McLellan 11-6 11-6 11-7
bt Sandra Rider 11-6 11-7 11-1

Quarter Final
bt Hiba Feredi 11-9 11-4 11-8

Semi Final
 bt Gosia Muda 11-5 11-4 18-16

Final
bt Ikue Humphrey 11-2 10-12 11-4 11-1

End of the cadet era

Today the new ratings and rankings were published. This is the last time Maria appears as a cadet and after a very successful year with a national title and the cadet masters win Maria finishes as second at cadets. This is her highest position since the number one Tin Tin has few years in front of Maria collecting points.

Looking forward to the Junior era and Maria begins by finding herself as the fifth junior in England.

First Round Dramatic win for Mixed Doubles at the Europeans

as reported by ETTA

It was seventh time lucky for Maria Tsaptsinos and Sam Mabey in their cadet mixed doubles match as they finally sealed their opportunity after spurning six previous match points.
The English pair were leading comfortably at 2-0 (11-8, 12-10) up but failed to convert three match points in the third game to eventually lose it 15-13 to Slovakian pair Tomas Kopanyi and Karolina Furkova.
When they also missed three match points in the fourth game to lose it 14-12 things got serious as the first-round encounter drifted into a deciding game.
However, this time Tsaptsinos and Mabey would not lose their heads as they took the game 11-9 on their seventh match point to secure a place in round two.
The win itself was a great upset as Kopanyi (35) and Furkova (56) were both higher ranked than Mabey (81) and Tsaptsinos (57).

Attending Bribar Guildford Grand Prix | ETTA Spotlight

Bribar Guildford Grand Prix | ETTA Spotlight

on Saturday the 8th of September

Attending Tees Sport Sussex 4* | ETTA Spotlight

Tees Sport Sussex 4* | ETTA Spotlight

Saturday 15th and Sunday the 16th of September 2012

European Youth - Team Report

The England Cadet team of Tin Tin Ho, Maria Tsaptsinos and Lois Peake were in Group F with Latvia and Switzerland. Unfortunately, despite that all teams ended up with one win and one loss England finished third, therefore their next games were to determine positions 29th and below. This is a system that does not really reflect the quality of our team since with one bad game you are relegated to such positions.
England lost to Latvia 3-0

MAKHAURI, Insana (LAT) - 144 TSAPTSINOS, Maria (ENG)

11 : 5

10 : 12

11 : 2

11 : 3

3 : 1

England beat Switzerland 3-2

144 TSAPTSINOS, Maria (ENG) - 491 REUST, Celine (SUI)

13 : 11

2 : 11

11 : 9

7 : 11

5 : 11

2 : 3

44 TSAPTSINOS, Maria (ENG) - 492 LINKE, Camille-Chloe (SUI)

11 : 6

1 : 11

11 : 7

11 : 7

3 : 1

Then England beat Finland 3-0

144 TSAPTSINOS, Maria (ENG) - 176 KIRITCHENKO, Anna (FIN)

1 : 11

11 : 6

11 : 5

15 : 13

3 : 1

and Luxemburg with the same score (Maria was rested)

Next game saw us winning against Luxembourg 3-0

144 TSAPTSINOS, Maria (ENG) - 33 MAMMADOVA, Dinara (AZE)

11 : 6

11 : 3

11 : 5

3 : 0

6 Cadet Nations Report

The six cadet nations tournament took place in Holland over the weekend. The countries of England, France, Germany, Denmark, Holland and Sweden and the respective players participated at the team event and the singles.

For the team event the girls finished 5th. The team consisted of Maria, Lois Peake, Lucy Zhu and Olivia Churchill.

One win over Denmark with 6-4 (Maria contributing two single wins against Nicoline Koefoed 1-11 4-11 4-11 and Sofie Egeholt  8-11 7-11 5-11 and a doubles win with Lois 9-11 5-11 8-11)


Lost to France 6-4 (Maria contributing a singles win over Eloïse Saint Dizier 11-3 9-11 6-11 9-11 and a doubles win partnering Lois 11-5 7-11 10-12 11-4 10-12)

Lost to Germany and Sweden 9-1 (Maria won one singles games against the Swedish girl Kristina Kallberg 8-11 6-11 13-11 11-9 7-11)


Drew with Netherlands 5-5 (Maria won against Amber Van De Velde 11-8 10-12 6-11 7-11 and won the doubles 10-12 11-9 6-11 3-11)


Therefore in 15 games including singles and doubles Maria won 8 times. 
Considering just the singles she won 5 out of 10.




For the singles, Maria was in group A with Melisssa Bours (Holland) , Leill Mostafavi (France), Emilie Jaffeux (France),Selja Fazlic (Germany),Malin Nilsson (Sweden) and Sofie Egeholt (Demnark).

Lost to Melissa 11-13 6-11 11-5 7-11

Lost to Leill 11-6 10-12 4-11 16-18

Lost to Emilie (and overall winner of the competition at the end) 11-8 14-12 11-13 8-11 11-8

Won against Selja 11-7 11-9 12-10

Won against Malin 11-8 11-2 11-7

Won against Sofie 11-3 12-10 11-9

to finish joint 3rd.

Cadet Masters Video

Watch the game against Tin Tin Ho for the Cadet Masters (2012), all 5 sets.

set 1

set 2

set 3

set 4

set 5

European Championships

Maria has been selected for the prestigious tournament in July in Austria to represent England as a Cadet with Tin Tin Ho and Lois Peake

Polish open day two

Delayed news. The team reached the semifinal where they lost to a strong German team. For the individual events Maria went through the group stage but lost next round.
For more details check ETTA report

Polish open day one

The England team of tin tin and Maria went through the group stage as group winners beating Austria A, Poland B and a mixed team of chech and new Zealand.
Then they went through to the next round after a 3-0 win against Poland C

Cadet Masters Video

One of the sets from the five game thriller...
Maria vs Tin Tin

Cadet Masters Photos