Minister for Sport and Minister for Multicultural Affairs Kate Lundy today joined 120 young table tennis players at Parliament House to launch the 2012 Hyundai Bennelong Cup.
Table tennis players from the Chinese women’s team and the Korean men’s team will play against the Australian teams when the competition begins on 19 October in Sydney. Over 2 days of competition, the Australian team will have the opportunity to compete against the world’s best players.
Senator Lundy said the Cup was a wonderful celebration of table tennis and multicultural Australia.
“With more than 40 million participants world wide table tennis has one of the largest player-bases of any sport in the world, and it is fantastic to welcome the world’s best firstly to Canberra, and then to Sydney on 19 and 20 October,” Senator Lundy said.“All Australians have an affinity with the game, with most at some stage playing a game in a friend’s garage or hosting a mini-tournament at a family BBQ.
“It’s fantastic that for some of those participants, a social game transforms into a passion to be the best, and it is great to see our next generation of table tennis players here today.”
Minister Lundy said the Australian Government committed almost $200,000 to increase the number of people playing table tennis in Australia.
“Table tennis is a sport of the future for Australia,” Senator Lundy said.
“Our recent results at the London Olympics and Paralympics are evidence that Australian table tennis is well and truly on the way up.”
