THE Okehampton College under 16 girls’ table tennis team has again qualified for the finals of the English Schools’ Table Tennis Association Butterfly National Team Championship.

The Okehampton team of Emily Haskell, Zoe Bennett, Megan Brogan and Mari Baldwin had captured the U13 girls’ trophy in 2015.

The U16s 2016 finals will be played at Hinckley Leisure Centre, Leicestershire on Saturday, April 16.

More than 270 teams, all of them already county champions, set out in the championship with just 32 teams qualifying to take part in one of the eight events which make up the finals.

Okehampton’s zone final victory in late January was followed by a regional final (one of four around the country) at which the team of Emily Haskell, Zoe Bennett, Megan Brogan and Mari Baldwin defeated teams from Buckinghamshire, West London and Kent.

To take the final step to become Butterfly National Schools’ champions the team will need to be at their very best at the finals. They will have to defeat opponents from Burlington Games Acad-emy (Hammersmith, London), Lancaster Girls’ Grammar School and West Kirby Grammar School (Merseyside) in what they realise will be the most pressured of atmospheres in this 50th anniversary of the first National Championships.