Paddington teenager achieve landmark moment in career

Paddington table tennis star Tin-Tin Ho is into the world’s top 100 for the first time after notching seven wins out of 10 at the recent World Team Championships.

The 19-year-old was ranked number 114 going into the tournament and joined Maria Tsaptsinos and Denise Payet in a young England squad for the event in Sweden.

The team, playing in the second division, started well with group victories over Dominican Republic (3-0), Switzerland (3-2) and the group top seeds Chile (3-1).

Ho lead the way with two victories against Chile, including beating world number 54 Paulina Vega 3-2 (9-11, 14-12, 7-11, 11-1, 11-5).

There followed a 3-1 defeat by Canada, and a subsequent 3-0 reverse at the hands of Serbia, which meant England were edged into fourth place in the group, meaning they entered into play-offs for the bottom half of the division.

A 3-2 defeat by Cuba meant they ended in the 40th-44th position bracket, but Ho’s world ranking has risen to a career-high 96 as a result of her performances.

Ho said: “I think it was good considering we only had the three players.

“We performed well as a team and got some good wins. We beat Chile, who were number 1 in the group.

“I’m quite pleased about winning seven out of 10 of my matches.

It’s been quite tough because I’m quite mentally tired from all the competitions – we had the Commonwealths and this, and in between we had a European match against Greece and I had two Austrian league matches. I’m still happy with how I performed.

Ho said she had aimed to step up her performance following the retirement of stalwart England star Kelly Sibley after the Commonwealth Games.

She added: “I tried to take on the lead role a little bit. Before, Kelly was the team leader and I tried to learn from her and am trying to fulfil that role.”

The added responsibility certainly worked a treat for Ho as she broke into the world’s top 100 for the first time in her career.

And the talented teenager will hope she can continue to climb the rankings during the remainder of the season.