Anna Hursey was among the surprise winners on the opening day of women's singles action at the European Table Tennis Championships ©Getty Images

Fifteen year-old Anna Hursey of Wales was among the surprise winners on the opening day of men’s and women’s singles action at the European Table Tennis Championships in Warsaw, Poland.

Players were attempting to top their respective groups in order to secure a place in the main singles draws.

Hursey, who was in good form having recently won two World Table Tennis youth events, upset 35th seed Maria Yovkova, as the Bulgarian lost to a player ranked 41 places below her 11-3, 11-8, 11-6.

It was a bad day for the top ranked player in Group Three, as following her defeat by Hursey, Yovkova lost to Prithika Pavade, with the Frenchwoman winning 11-5, 7-11, 11-9, 11-8.

Sabina Surjan of Serbia, the 38th seed, suffered a surprise opening defeat to Lia Yuan of Austria, as the 80th seed prevailed 7-11, 11-8, 11-5, 11-5, although Surjan bounced back in her next match defeating Ema Labosova of Slovakia 11-5, 8-11, 11-7, 11-9.

The top seed in Group Nine, Ozge Yilmaz of Turkey was also on the end of an upset at the hands of Polish player Katarzyna Wegrzyn 6-11, 11-3, 11-5, 11-7, before Yilmaz went on to lose to Hana Haripovic of Croatia 12-10, 11-3, 3-11, 11-5.

The women’s group winners will be finalised tomorrow once the remaining matches are played in each group.

In the men’s singles draw, one of the day’s biggest upsets was caused by Viktor Yefimov of Ukraine who beat Benedek Olah of Finland, the world number 33, in five games 11-6, 11-6, 6-11, 4-11, 11-9.

Yefimov followed his shock win over Olah with another victory against Yonatan Shusterman of Israel 11-9, 11-6, 11-9.

Meanwhile, Dimitrije Levajac of Serbia beat a player ranked almost 300 places above him as the world number 387 shocked 96th seed Lee Walker of England, winning in five games 11-5, 11-9, 5-11, 7-11, 11-3.

Samuel Kulcyzcki of Poland qualified after winning Group Four, by beating Walker in four games and Levajac in three.

Group winners on the men’s side of the draw were decided today with all matches played.

Yefimov, Joao Geraldo of Portugal, Lubomir Jancarik and Tomas Polansky of the Czech Republic, Kulcyzcki, Niagol Stoyanov, Mihai Bobocica and Marco Rech Daldosso of Italy, Truls Moregard of Sweden, Vladislav Ursu of Moldova, Lev Katsman and Vladimir Sidorenko of Russia, Yevhen Pryshchepa of Ukraine, Adam Szudi and Nandor Ecseki of Hungary, Robin Devos and Martin Allegro of Belgium, Hunor Szocs and Rares Sipos of Romania, Abdullah Yigenler of Turkey, Andreas Levenko of Austria, Alexandre Cassin of France, Aleksandr Khanin of Belarus and Zsolt Peto of Serbia progressed to the main draw by topping their groups.