Loopers are the first team through to the grand final of the Lithgow Table Tennis Association winter competition following a fortunate victory over Grippers in the major semi-final played at the Old Trades Hall.
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Earlier in the week Charolais had ended the season for KaPooLow with an emphatic 16-5 fourth-place play-off triumph. KaPooLow had won the first rubber to lead 2-1 but a 12-1 burst from Charolais put them up 13-3 and they cruised into the semi-finals.
Charolais' trip to the semis was short-lived though, with the in-form Spinners putting them to the sword. The Minor Semi-final encounter was tied at 4-all after three rubbers, but Spinners found another gear, winning the last six singles rubbers by a combined 12 games to 4 to progress to the Final, 16-8.
All of the Spinners were in good touch, with Mal Jeffries having the best record at 6-2, while Linda Kappos and Mark McAulay both finished at 5-3.
Charolais had a big comedown after a good play-off win, and no one could get into positive territory with Mark Watchorn playing three three-gamers for 4-5, Sharnie Robert going 3-5 and Leon Rust 1-6.
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The major semi-final between joint minor-premiers Grippers and Loopers was marred by the fact that Grippers went in a player short and automatically forfeited eight games. However, they almost pulled off a miracle. Grippers dropped the first rubber 2-0 to be effectively 10-0 down but then rattled off 10 of the next 11 games to go into the only doubles trailing just 11-10. A 2-0 win would have given Grippers the most unlikely of victories but their effort in the singles took too much juice and Loopers won it comfortably themselves 2-0 to advance to the Grand Final, 13-10.
Only Michael Wood (2-2) could break even for Loopers, while Riza Wiradi (1-4) and Pauline Wellfare (0-4) struggled against the Gripper onslaught.
Dave Mays fought valiantly to almost get his Grippers side home, producing the night's only perfect 6-0 result, and Lou Kappos (4-3) played his part in making the match closer than it was expected to be.
This week's match: Final; Grippers v Spinners.