Ethan fought through some sticky moments early in the competition to win the title.
The Stevenage Nobel student player, beat Amirul Hussain in the final 4-1 (8-11, 11-6, 11-9, 11-4, 14-12).

In the semi-finals, Walsh had beaten his doubles partner, Joe Cope, 4-2 (11-7, 11-7, 9-11, 11-13, 11-7, 11-8), while Hussain needed one set fewer to see off Jamie Liu (11-13, 11-5, 11-5, 12-10, 11-6).

Back in the quarter-finals, Walsh had to fight hard to shake off Naphong Boonyaprapa 4-3 (12-10, 12-10, 6-11, 5-11, 11-5, 16-18, 11-8)

Walsh said: “It’s probably my biggest event of the year. At points I wasn’t playing my best but I had to keep fighting and push through.

“In the final my hard work paid off and I started playing better and was more relaxed.” “I am proud to be National Champion 4 times as I know not many players have achieved this”

Ethan’s record is up their with the best and is starting to make history.

It didn’t end there as Ethan and his partner went on to get to the final of the Cadet boys doubles losing out to Sam Chesterman and Amirul Hussain but picking up another medal (silver) in the Nationals was another great achievement.

This was all played at Medway over the weekend with the Cadets being played on the Saturday and Juniors on the Sunday.

Junior Boys Doubles

Ethan knew Sunday was going to be a tough day as he was to come up against Tom Jarvis and partner Luke Savill very early on (Tom is the number 1 under 18 in England and also picked to represent England in the Olympic Games) – Ethan and James Smith were doubles partners and have represented England playing together in the team and doubles abroad on many occasions and play great together but looking at the draw were not confident having Tom Jarvis and Luke Savill number 1 seeds in the quarters.

It was a good start for Walsh and Smith having started by beating yesterday’s Cadet champions Amirul Hussain & Sam Chesterman in the first round. Smith & Walsh then had the number 1 seeds Jarvis/Savill in the quarter finals. What a performance they put in – recovered from going 2-1 down to Jarvis & Savill, playing with real authority in games four and five as they completed a 3-2 (14-12, 9-11, 5-11, 11-4, 11-6) triumph. James went on to say “For me and Ethan, beating Tom Jarvis and Luke Savill is probably one of the best results of our careers. We just tried to stop them from playing and take any chances they gave us.” A big crowd was around the table to watch their win and there was a big roar from players and crowd when they won. Not over yet though.

They then went on to defeat Samuel Kwan & Josh Harland in the semi-finals, in four sets.

Walsh and Smith did not expect to get to the final of this event and came across Matt Leete/Josh Bennet in the final (both doubles pairs represent England in their respective age group) – it was a great final with lots of rallies but Walsh and Smith ended up losing 3-1 and taking silver in this event.
Walsh went on to say “its been a great National Championships for me winning 1 gold and 2 silvers. I have the Spanish Open next week so I will go to that with confidence” Ethan has a busy few months ahead playing Internationally – good luck !!

In the doubles Ethan was paired up with IIia Kortchinski from Belarus and they had never played together before so needed to get used to each others game quickly. In their opening match the managed to get a 3-2 win over Marc Gutierrez and Miguel Nunez from Spain. After never playing together they had a great run and got to the last 16 where they came up from a strong pair from Hungary and they lost 3-1

It was a strong tournament and Ethan performed well. ” I am concentrating on my European events this year” Ethan went on to say ” I am hoping to be selected by England for the Spanish and Swedish Youth Open as well as the Six Nations next year so I am training harder than ever”

In the Men’s Over 40s Singles, there were shocks as un-seeded Django Fung took the Title. Django, who is more renowned as the Manager of Ronnie O’Sullivan and Judd Trump, turned his attention to Table Tennis. In the top half of the draw, No. 1 Seed Rik James lost a close five setter to Mark Wicker, only for Mark to lose in the Semi-Final to No. 4 seed, Gary Young. In the bottom half of the draw, there was an early shock when No. 3 seed Kevin Read, lost in straight sets to unseeded Django Fung. Django then beat Southend Premier Player, Babul McLeod, again in straight sets. The Final was a very tight match poised at two sets all and 9 all in the decisive fifth Set, before Django took the Title 9, -12, -5, 6, 9. This was the shock of Championships, great effort by Django.