Our World Federation, the FIPJP, informed us earlier this month that they will be organising a one-day qualifier on Saturday 29th November in Luxembourg to determine which European teams will fill the remaining quota allocated to the continent for the Men’s Worlds Triples Championship 2026 (date and venue yet to be confirmed).
Rather than use the results in the Men’s European Triples Championships to decide the invitations (previously Europe had a quota of 24), the FIPJP has shifted to a new process where the Top 24 teams in the previous Men’s World Triples Championship will receive an automatic invitation and everyone else will have to qualify via an FIPJP controlled process.
Had the previous process remained in place, England would have automatically qualified by virtue of the fact that we achieved a Top 16 finishing position at the 2025 Men’s Triples European Championships in Santa Susanna, repeating the same finishing position that we achieved two years previously at the European Championships in Albertville.
At the 2024 Men’s World Championships in Dijon, England were unsuccessful in reaching the Top 24, so we now must compete in the one-day qualifier.
The following 12 European Federations were placed in the Top 24 in Dijon and will therefore not be required to compete in Luxembourg: Italy, France, Belgium, Monaco, Sweden, Turkey, Germany, Denmark, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Spain and Finland.
The European quota has been reduced by the FIPJP from 24 to 21, so this means that there are nine remaining paces to be filled, and this will be determined by a single day five-round Swiss competition. Every European federation that wishes to compete can attend, underlining the FIPJP’s stance that performance at the European Championships should not have any bearing on the qualification for the World Championships. It is unknown as yet which European federations will compete.
In selecting our team for the FIPJP qualifier, the PE Board has decided that the team that won the 2025 SSE competition and met our performance target at the 2025 European championships should be offered the representation. If any member of that team was then not able to play, available places should be offered to members of the team that finished as runners up in the 2025 SSE process. The PE Board has further decided that if the selected team is successful in securing one of the nine European invitations this does not mean that they will then represent England at the 2026 World Championships. The 2026 SSE process will be used to determine representation.
After approaching all four members of the winning 2025 SSE process/2025 European Championships team: Dean Ashby, Scott Ashby, Rowland Jones and Jason White, we discovered that unfortunately Scott will not be able to participate due to impending paternity leave. The other members of the team positively indicated their availability.
We then considered who should be offered the available place from the members of the runners up team in the 2025 SSE process, namely, Sam Blakey, Ben Gallimore, Jeremy Huntley and Kai Sheffield.
Based on an assessment of his performance levels this year plus his fit within the team as a utility player and his significant pitch time in a variety of playing environments with the other members of the team, it was decided to offer Kai the available place. Everyone who has seen Kai play this season I am sure will agree that his first ever Senior Men’s representation is fully merited.
The team are now preparing to battle for England’s place at the 2026 World Championships, and they will be joined once again by Coach Tim Edwins.
We are sure that all of PE’s members and supporters would want to wish them all the best in this competition.