European Championships | 2 Feb 2017

Sochi opened doors and hearts to first ever STAG European U21 Championships

In the eve of the STAG 2017 European Under 21 Championships hosts, alongside ETTU high representatives and members of the Russia’s national team held the press conference. Representative of the city of Sochi Sergey VOLYNSKIY welcomed the guests alongside the First Vice President of the Table Tennis Federation of Russia Vladimir GRIGORIEV, joined by the ETTU Youth Committee Chairwoman Sandra DEATON and the members of the Russia’s team.

 

“In next few days we will see all of the results of hard work that was done by ETTU and TTFR to organize this event. I want to underline a huge contribution of Igor LEVITIN, the chairman of TTFR Executive Board and President of our federation Alexander BABAKOV to make this project successful. I hope that this tournament will be a celebration of the sport for all of the participants. I want also thank representatives of Krasnodarskiy region and the city of Sochi for their help in organizing this event,” said Vladimir GRIGORIEV, Vice president of TTFR.

 

It is the first Under 21 European Championships.  

 

“ETTU put tremendous effort to organize the event for this age group, which in the past has very little opportunities to bridge the gap between the young and senior categories. It is a great gap between junior competition and major circuit. This event will bring the best European players under the age of 21 and I`m sure that it will be organized as well as 2015 European Championships in Ekaterinburg, “ stated ETTU Youth Committee Chairwoman Sandra DEATON.

 

Igor RUBTSOV, head coach of Russian junior team added:

 

“Our main goal here is to get medals. Of course, we want to show good results in front of our people. Saadi is our leader as number 10 seed, but we hope that Konstantin CHERNOV and Vladimir SIDORENKO will also deliver success. The gap in class between players is not so evident, that`s why there are will be a lot of contenders for the medal rostrum in men`s field. “

 

Andrey KRUTOV, head coach of Russian junior team (women) explained:

 

“We have been working very hard in last few weeks. First, it was camp with the focus on physical preparation and then our players got the opportunity to feel competitive spirit at the ITTF Hungarian Open. The final camp was here, in Sochi. We have great starting positions and all of our players are seeded in Top 10, which says a lot. Our main rivals here are very strong girls from Germany and Romania.”