Ross Wilson
Ross is a table tennis player who has won medals for both England and Great Britain at the Paralympic Games, Commonwealth Games, World Championships and European Championships.
Trustees were delighted to learn in May 2026 that his experience and success had resulted in him being appointed as National Coach with the British Para Table Tennis Team, working full-time with the squad at the UK Institute of Sport in Sheffield.
Ross, who has expressed his gratitude to the SYDF many times in the past, said: “I want to turn us from being one of the best teams in the world to the best team in the world. I want to push the players and the other coaches and work with them to push me to help them as well.”
BPTT Interim Performance Director Shaun Marples has no doubt that Ross’s experience and skills as an athlete will bring huge benefit to the team as the new national coach.
“All the candidates we interviewed could talk around the game of table tennis and about technical parts of the game,” said Marples, “but the key thing that stood out with Ross was the tactical elements of the game and how he delivered them on a world-class stage under pressure.
“His experience will really help mentor players who might not have reached that level yet and will learn a lot from somebody who has.”
Current Co-chair Sarah Drury said: “We were obviously thrilled by his Paralympic successes and are thrilled to hear of his appointment as national coach.”
On a family holiday to Centre Parcs, at seven years old, Ross played table tennis for the first time. A member of staff, observing Ross’s skills and his Arsenal shirt, declared him to be “the Thierry Henry of table tennis”. It was a bold statement at the time, but Ross’s medal haul came to resemble that of the iconic Henry.
Ross, from Minster, Sheppey, first approached the fund for assistance in July 2005 when he was 10 years old. Over the next seven years, trustees were happy to offer further support on several occasions as he continued to progress through his natural abilities.
Vice-President Carole Nealey, who was Chairman at the time, said: “Ross impressed us from the start, with his commitment and self-belief, as well as his ability.”
Ross won two National doubles titles and was ranked in the top ten in the country as a junior, able-bodied athlete. Despite spending over ten years trying to find a diagnosis for an unexplained limp, Ross and his family finally got an explanation for this issue when, in 2011, he was diagnosed with multiple epiphyseal dysplasia (a.k.a. MED or Fairbank’s disease), a rare genetic disorder. The transition into disabled sport was seamless after that. A silver medal at the European Championships in that same year earned him qualification for the London 2012 Paralympics, where he won bronze (at just seventeen years old) in the men’s class 6-8 team event.
Achieving similar success at the next Paralympic Games seemed unlikely when Ross suffered a series of injuries and was forced to spend two years away from the sport. To his immense credit he fought back to win bronze at the European Championships in 2015 and bronze at the Paralympics in 2016, again in the team event. Ross embodied the highs and lows of athlete life as injuries continued to be his unwelcome companion. He was forced to take further time away from competition in 2017 but still bagged another bronze at that year’s European Championships.
Achieving similar success at the next Paralympic Games seemed unlikely when Ross suffered a series of injuries and was forced to spend two years away from the sport. To his immense credit he fought back to win bronze at the European Championships in 2015 and bronze at the Paralympics in 2016, again in the team event. Ross embodied the highs and lows of athlete life as injuries continued to be his unwelcome companion. He was forced to take further time away from competition in 2017 but still bagged another bronze at that year’s European Championships.
Having won Paralympic team medals in London 2012, Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2021, Ross reached a career high of world No 2 in men’s class 8. In April 2018 he won gold in the men’s class 6-10 singles at the Commonwealth Games in Australia and later that year became men’s class 8 world champion after beating the double Paralympic champion from China in the final in the World Championships. He had told his coach at aged 7, that he wanted to be a world champion, and he achieved his goal.
As reigning world champion, Ross added to his medal collection with his second European silver (2019). Another bronze followed at the Birmingham Commonwealth Games of 2022.
In recognition of his sustained success, Ross has been inducted into the Hall of Champions at the English Institute of Sport, Sheffield.