Organising practice nights

[youngstt]

Hi,

just wondering how others organise their club practice nights. We have 4 tables and allow 12-14 players per night.& have 3 problems.
1) Despite repeated reminders some players stay on the table too long which means some are sitting out longer than they should
2) Some players get left out as others don't invite them to play
3) Some players form a clique and always want to play each other

Unless someone constantly monitors whats happening, how do other clubs handle this?

 

[Lazer]

Hi,

just wondering how others organise their club practice nights. We have 4 tables and allow 12-14 players per night.& have 3 problems.
1) Despite repeated reminders some players stay on the table too long which means some are sitting out longer than they should
2) Some players get left out as others don't invite them to play
3) Some players form a clique and always want to play each other

Unless someone constantly monitors whats happening, how do other clubs handle this?

We have a coach that takes care of this. If we are an uneven number of players and a table is available he plays too. We have played for a long time so advice is hard to give and we don’t care too much. We focus on the exercise context not so much on our technique.

Cheers
L-zr

 

[Lula]

Maybe to many players at the same time?

 

[youngstt]

Yes possibly true. But even with 12 on 4 tables that should be ok if players don't spend too long on the table. But some just don't pay attention to how long they are playing for.

 

[langel]

In our newest TT club it's organized like that:

Practice Night is held on Mondays from 7 p.m. till 8.30-9 p.m.

Usual number of players 8-12.

The practice is managed by 2 coaches.

One of the coaches is training the less experienced players on table 1

The other coach is organizing the other players, separating them to couples depending on their experience and giving appropriate tasks and advices. The couples are placed from table 2 to table 6 /or 8/ according their skill level.

At some point, usually after 45 minutes, all the players start to play a match on the tables they are at the moment.
The matches are held blitz. When one all couples finish the match, it stops a;; matches.
Then the losers from every table move to the table with a smaller number, and the winners move to bigger numbers.
And this is repeated several times, usually 3-4.
At the end the coaches decide to remap the couples and them all play full matches till the nd of the session.

That's what we call Practice Night here.

Aside from that the hall is open every day 10 a.m. - 10 p.m..

 

[youngstt]

Thanks, that sound good. But i think you have a better ratio of tables to players and the benefit of 2 coaches to organise things. And being open 12 hours is great, we only have 2 1/2 hours and have to fit everything into that. Do you have players sitting out who need to come on? Someone suggested setting a timer for 20 minutes then the 4-6 sitting out come on and 4-6 go off. But still needs regulating, would be good to have a system that runs itself !

 

[langel]

Thanks, that sound good. But i think you have a better ratio of tables to players and the benefit of 2 coaches to organise things. And being open 12 hours is great, we only have 2 1/2 hours and have to fit everything into that. Do you have players sitting out who need to come on? Someone suggested setting a timer for 20 minutes then the 4-6 sitting out come on and 4-6 go off. But still needs regulating, would be good to have a system that runs itself !

No, during practice night and regular practice session we don't have sitting players.
We have sitting players during the tournaments, in this new hall 4 times a week, in the other hall - 7 times a week 😅
But in the new hall we have more league players, groups and teams of all ages. So sometimes we have casual players "sitting" for a free table.

 

[KMTT]

We have 2 sessions per night (1.5 hours each), 6 tables, 12 players each session arranged via an online booking system. The coach sorts attendees into 2 groups, usually higher level players together and mixes up partners during the session every 30 mins.

 

[youngstt]

Again thats sounds better as you have more table for the number of players so no one sits out. We have a few too many players, but the sport is dying out locally so difficult to turn players away.

 

[langel]

Then you have to keep calm and manage the crowd, or just control the crowd.

This picture is from between the pandemic lockdowns.

 

[Brs]

14 people on four tables in 2.5 hours is ok, not great. Everyone gets to play 1.4 hours and sits out 1.1.

You could organize it as a league night with two groups of 6-7 and play best 2 out of 3 RR.

 

[KMTT]

Used to be 10 people or more waiting around per session but the booking system has changed that, it allows a max 12 people and the 2 sessions per night means that most players are catered for, providing they bother to book.

 

[langel]

14 people on four tables in 2.5 hours is ok, not great. Everyone gets to play 1.4 hours and sits out 1.1.

You could organize it as a league night with two groups of 6-7 and play best 2 out of 3 RR.

We play tournaments with 7 players 5 days a week and the tournament takes 2 and a half hours. On 3 tables. Each player is sitting one match long. some 15- 20 minutes, never an hour.
If we make two groups on 6 tables, with finals of the best 2 of each group, it would take at least 40 minutes more.

 

[ShakeHold PenHand]

My club is lucky in that we play nearly all nights with enough tables to go around for the 20-30 ppl who show up

A much closer club however has that same issue where there are only 4 tables to go around 15 people