Darlington's Claire Wilson provided the major shock result at last weekend's English National Junior Table Tennis trials in Southampton.

The 14-year-old Carmel schoolgirl gained six impressive victories, but by far the best was that over No 2 seed Lucy Pointer.

A tense match was eventually won 21-19, 22-20 against not only one of the favourites, but a player who is in the National Academy.

Pointer's powerful forehand was matched by a superb mixture of control and fast counter hitting and the result almost gained Wilson a place in the national top 12 masters even.

Level on matches won and sets won with Pointer, Kelly Craven-Griffiths (Leics) and Clare Langford (Ches) only a count back of points could separate the four players with Pointer and Craven-Griffiths going through.

Joanne Meads, Andrew Leighton and Mark Simpson also picked up valuable victories in search of the computer ranking points needed to push them further up the national ranking list. David Meads, 11, only played in the U17 boys event but the too showed improved form without winning in a category crammed with older top ranked juniors.

The impressive display by Darlington's youngsters comes after the special training camps under the guidance of the club's former European champion John Hilton. More are planned and Darlington's youngsters look set for a successful second half of the season.