Mixed emotions on England duty

The Skegness teenager put England 1-0 ahead in emphatic style as he beat Ivor Katic 3-0 (11-4, 12-10, 11-5) in the opening tie at Gillingham.

But by the time of his second match, England were trailing 2-1 following 3-2 defeats for Paul Drinkhall and Sam Walker at the hands of Zsolt Peto and Aleksandar Karakasevic respectively.

Jarvis had the task of trying to keep the match alive against Peto.

And it was a thriller as he led 1-0 and then went 2-1 behind, before tying it up at 2-2 with an 11-0 blitz in the fourth game.

However, Peto regained the initiative and went on to seal a 3-2 (6-11, 12-10, 11-9, 0-11, 11-9) triumph to complete overall victory for his nation.

Having also lost away to Serbia and having been beaten Bosnia twice, it means England will finish second in the group.

They now await the draw for the second phase of qualifying for the 2019 Championships.

Jarvis said: “I think I played well in both matches and the second one could have gone either way.

“I don’t think I did anything wrong, but he (Peto) was good when it was tight and made it difficult for me.”

On the 11-0 game, he added: “I didn’t think about that afterwards – all I was trying to do was think about winning the next point.”