A CHANCE meeting with a referee led to a Herefordshire table tennis umpire officiating at the Special Olympics in Los Angeles.

Harry Jutle, who umpired at last year's Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, said he only ended up going to LA after meeting Michael Mears in Luxembourg.

"The fact that a colleague of mine and I had umpired at the UK Special Olympics in 2013 in Bath came up and this prompted Michael to invite us to the event, especially when it was described that this was for people with special needs," said Jutle.

"Michael said he was the referee for the event and welcomed our experience.

"I said I would only be interested if my wife Gurmit would go.

"My colleague did not choose to go, but I set about what was needed to make this a reality and had to do a lot of preparatory work, including getting Gurmit to qualify as a local empire un order to qualify as an official to get accommodation.

"She did not actually expect to umpire, only to be there as a general helper."

The husband and wife team officiated matches involving Great Britain's Jessica Bromley and Emma Hunt, who won gold and silver medals respectively at the Special Olympics.

"We managed to get have our photographs with the British team," said Jutle.

"Overall, Simon [Richardson] won gold in the men's singles, and the girls also won a silver in the doubles.

"After the ceremony, we returned to score more doubles and continued umpiring the doubles to their conclusion.

"Gurmit enjoyed the experience and will now go for the county umpire qualification."