VETTS ENGLAND SUCCESSES AS HOSTS OF HOME NATIONS 2025
by Susie Venner, VETTS Chairman
VETTS England players dominated the Veterans Home Nations Championships 2025 winning a total of 36 of the 50 gold and silver medals being contested between the seven Home Nations in team, singles and doubles events.
The Veterans Home Nations Championships was organised and hosted by the volunteers from the VETTS with the support of Turners-Distribution, and was held at Nottingham Trent University in September 2025.
The VETTS welcomed teams, supporters and delegates from Guernsey; Isle of Man; Ireland; Jersey; Scotland and Wales for a weekend of highly competitive table tennis amongst the Countries' top players, combined with a social atmosphere to renew friendships and make new ones.
The VETTS England teams are selected from VETTS members who have played at least three VETTS Masters events in the season, are eligible to play for an English county, have not represented another Nation in the previous three years - and then on strict VETTS ranking order.
As hosts, the VETTS England squad, captained by John Poysden, entered A and B teams in all bar one event, taking gold in all eight team events - O/40s men and women; O/50s Men and women; O/60s Men and Women; O/70s Open and O/75 Open and silver in six of the eight events.
In the singles, Stewart Crawford (Scotland) and Rita Kacsandi (Ireland) took gold in the O/40s Men's and Women's Singles respectively after close fought finals against VETTS England rivals, Adam Fuzes and Hurey Ahmetoglu. VETTS England claimed the other seven singles titles.
In the doubles, it was a clean sweep of golds for the hosts.
Notable golden hat-tricks of wins in the Team, Singles and Doubles go to VETTS England players Jason Ramage (O/50s) and Tim Dyson (O/60s) and Michele Reeves (O/50s).
Before referring to the roll of honour for the winners and runners up, there is another roll of honour which deserves recognition - that of the VETTS volunteers who gave their time and expertise to make this event happen:
* John Hook who worked for months to pull this together as our project manager;
* Debby Auvache who managed everything down to the last detail to create a wonderful presentation evening and gala dinner;
* Kim Mudge, who interrupted her holidays to be our Tournament Referee, and together with her hard-working team of Michael Stewart, Viv Barry and Cliff Bell delivered the event with professionalism and good humour;
* Mike Rhodes, our photographer, who captured the action shots, as well as the team photos and the glamour of the presentation night;
* Jason Ramage, who liaised with Nottingham Trent University to provide the venue (as well as winning three golds);
* Turners-Distribution for their generous contribution towards the VETTS costs in hosting this event;
* Bribar, for their on-going support as one of our main equipment providers;
* and last but not least, our VETTS community for stepping up to help make this event happen.
Congratulations and thanks to all players, delegates and supporters for a memorable weekend of competitive and friendly table tennis. The baton hands over to Jersey as next year's hosts.
The roll of honour is attached.
Home Nations Team Event Results:
https://vetts.tournamentsoftware.com/sport/tournament.aspx?id=6f6c6f19-cd85-4827-a7cf-78e2be20e22b
Home Nations Singles and Doubles Results:
https://vetts.tournamentsoftware.com/tournament/C2613113-1280-414E-A6F3-F2E71E0A605F
Mike Rhodes photographers can be seen on his Flickr feed:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/126662554@N04/albums/