Minutes of the AGM held at Brome Swan on Monday 4th July 2016.

Attending the meeting were:- Ted Ling (President), David Mortlock(Chairman), John Bryant (Vice Chairman/Results Secretary), Chris Willoughby (League Secretary), Paul Mortlock (Treasurer), Stuart Filmer (Press Secretary), Paul Sturman (Committee Member), Pat West (Committee Member), Adrian Key (Committee Member), Tom Bailey (Palgrave Stars).

There were no apologies offered for absence ( although following the meeting I noted a text received at 7:58pm from Trevor Cottee offering his apologies for not attending).
Apologies were offered by John Bryant for the change of date of the AGM.

Minutes of previous AGM.
The minutes were circulated and were agreed as a true copy of the 2015 AGM and accordingly were signed by the chairman.

Election of Chairman
The president took the chair and offered the chairman position to those attending the meeting. John Bryant proposed David Mortlock and this was seconded by Chris Willoughby. David Mortlock was therefore elected chairman and took over the meeting.

Presidents Opening Remarks.
The president addressed the meeting. First thanking the Chairman,Vice Chairman and League Secretary for their hard work during the past year. He went on to thank Chris Willoughby and Jonathan Mortlock for their lunchtime Table Tennis training sessions at Diss High School which, he felt were invaluable to the continuance of the League.
He thanked David, Jonathon and Alan Worthington for their attendance at the Tuesday night open practise and training sessions, which continue to generate an interest within and outside of the League.
The President commented on the number of youngsters that had attended Presentation night, feeling that this was due, in part to the work put in at the high school in the lunchtime sessions and the Tuesday evening Open Practice nights.He also felt the work put in at Dickleburgh by Stuart Filmer, who he also thanked for his work as Press Secretary, generated a lot of interest in the younger players.
He also thanked Francis Webb for his work as County Representative. He thanked Paul Mortlock for his work as Treasurer and also thanked the committee for their work through the last season.

There was a special mention for David Leeder, who was likely to be retiring from League Table Tennis through ill health. He said that David has been a great ambassador for the sport over the years and his presence at the table will be missed.
The president also mentioned that ex- table tennis player, Kenny Roberts had recently passed away and he wanted to wish his Widow, Margaret and the family, condolences on behalf of the league. He commented that Kenny will be sorely missed.

Chairmans Report
The Chairman echoed the Presidents thank you's. Particularly noting the school lunchtime sessions.

Treasurers Report
The Treasurer produced a set of accounts to the meeting. He informed the meeting that the league had made £600 profit, which was basically from the Tuesday night open practice night at Diss High School. He commented that there was a slight loss of revenue on the handbook due to one less advert and the revenue from league registration fees were similar to recent years.
The cost of trophies and engraving for last year had increased, but an additional trophy had been purchased.
A little extra had been spent on food etc for presentation evening, but this still resulted in a slight profit on the night.
Total cash held by league amounts to £6,365.10. So the league is in a healthy situation financially.
Chris Willoughby commented on the £311.98 spent on balls. John Bryant responded that a large number plastic balls were purchased, for resale to league clubs @ £6.60 for 6. Both David and John both had a stock of balls should any clubs be interested in purchasing them.
This subject generated some discussion concerning which balls were to be used this coming season. John Bryant pointed out that at last years AGM it was agreed that plastic balls would be used by all clubs for the 2016 to 2017 season. Tom Bailey suggested that the fact that the league has table tennis balls for sale should be mentioned on the website so that all who may be interested in purchasing them are aware.

League Secretaries Report
Chris commented that he occasionally gets enquirers about joining the league. He either refers them to the Tuesday night sessions, or to DC3.

Results Secretaries Report
John stated that the website was still improving with additional tweaking being carried out by TT365. All teams mainly enter there own scores and those that do not either use the online scorecard or email.
Following last years AGM, where Peter Buck commented that more people may submit reports if a report option was situated on the same page as the score entry. Following this the website was changed so that a report option is available immediately following score entry. This was available all through last season, but still no extra reports were received.

A discussion followed concerning lack of reports in newspapers. On the website there were reports covering the junior championships, open championships etc. It was felt that these and the tables could be published occasionally in local newspapers. It was agreed that more effort would be made to try to ensure this happens in the coming season. Chris Willoughby also suggested that registration evening should be published in a local paper before the event to generate awareness outside of the league.

John commented that the junior and open championships both had increased support. Particularly the junior event was very well attended. Reports for all the events held throughout the season are published on the website. The handicap competition also seemed to go well. With Palgrave Stars being the eventual winners.


Press Secretaries Report
No actual report but Stuart agreed that he would endeavour to get more in the press this coming season.

Election of Officers
Vice Chairman.
John Bryant agreed to continue in the post, proposed by David Mortlock and seconded by the meeting members.

League Secretary.
Chris Willoughby agreed to continue in the post, proposed by David Mortlock and seconded by the meeting members.

Treasurer
Paul Mortlock agreed to continue in the post, proposed by John Bryant and seconded by David Mortlock.

Results Secretary.
John Bryant agreed to continue in the post, proposed by David Mortlock and seconded by Chris Willoughby.
County Representative
Chris Willoughby agreed to take on this position and also agreed to become the Table Tennis England representative. Proposed by David Mortlock and seconded by John Bryant.

Press Secretary
Stuart Filmer agreed to continue. Proposed by David Mortlock and seconded by the meeting members.

Committee Members.
All current members present agreed to continue. Those re-elected members are Paul Sturman, Pat West , Adrian Key, Alan Worthington and Francis Webb was elected in his absence.

Registration Fees and Registration night.
League fees to remain the same.
Registration night to take place on Monday 8th August 2016, 8:00pm at Brome Swan.

Chris and Stuart will liaise to place a piece in press advertising registration night.

A discussion ensued on number of teams likely to be registering for the league.

The Chairman wanted to discuss the currentformat of the Championships. Feeling that playing the finals at the end of the day was too much to fit in, and also by that time of the day everyone was exhausted. Chris Willoughby agreed and suggested a finals night, this had been done previously in the league and was popular. The Chairman agreed and this was felt to be a better format.
Pat West also felt if this was done then a fairer allocation of time could be given to First Division events which Pat felt were not given enough.
The committee stated that a finals night date would need to be set prior to the Championships. So participants were aware if they won through to the final of the date of the final. Tom Bailey suggested that if a finalist was unable to make finals night, then the runner up should take the finalists place. This was agreed and adopted by the Committee.
So on Championship day all games will be played up to the final, but the finals will be played on a finals only evening.

New teams being entered by existing players / teams.
This refers to premier teams putting in additional teams who are made up of premiership standard players. Obviously they have not earned the right to go straight into the premier division, so do we enter them in the lower or higher division.
A long discussion ensued and it was agreed by all members that if the league committee was aware of the standard of players involved that immediate entry to the premier division was advantageous and did more to encourage participation.

Any other business.

The Committee went on to discuss an entry change in the handbook for qualifying for the closed Championships for under 21's. It was concluded that under 21 entrants would need to be registered as league players and also comply with the number of matches played (i.e.4 matches). However, under 18 year olds, would be able to enter the Championships, at the discretion of the committee. All other players would also have needed to play 4 matches to qualify for the closed Championships.

John Bryant advised that Table Tennis England fees have been raised to £12 for Seniors and £6 for juniors.

David and Paul Mortlock raised the issue of altering the age groupings in the Championships. He suggested altering the 40- 60 age group to 40- 54 and then 55 and over instead of the over 60 group.
This set off a discussion amongst all members. The age groups of the entry for the championships was discussed intently. However other members did not believe there was much benefit to doing this. It was left that we would look at the numbers in the various groups to ascertain if there was any benefit in making these changes.

There was no other business and the meeting was closed at 9:15