Member Associations | 16 Mar 2012

SCHLAGER organized ideal preparations for adversaries

Winner of the Men’s Singles title at the LIEBHERR World Table Tennis Championship in the Parisien suburb of Bercy in May 2003, when causing China intense pain by beating defending title holder WANG Liqin and the reigning Olympic champion, KONG Linghui, Austria’s Werner SCHLAGER is now playing an integral role in China’s preparations for major global events.

Opened in early 2011 in the Vienna suburb of Schwechat, the organisation which bears his name, the WERNER SCHLAGER ACADEMY (WSA), has welcomed players from over one hundred countries in a period of just over one year.

Notably, prior to the GAC GROUP World Championships staged in Rotterdam in May 2011, the Chinese National Team, spent one week training in the state-of-art premises afforded by the WERNER SCHLAGER ACADEMY. The preparation proved ideal; China won every title on offer and provided all the finalists in every event!

One year later, in preparation for the LIEBHERR World Team Championships to be staged in the German city of Dortmund from Sunday 25th May to Sunday 1st April 2012, the Chinese have returned to the WERNER SCHLAGER ACADEMY.

A 30 strong party of players, coaches, physiotherapists, doctors and officials arrived on Friday 16th March 2012; they will practise at the WERNER SCHLAGER ACADEMY for one week, departing for Dortmund on Thursday 22nd March.

“It is a great pleasure and honour for the WSA that the Chinese national team again has chosen our facilities for their World Championships preparations”, said Werner SCHLAGERr, who may well prove to be one of their main adversaries in Dortmund. Austria, like China, competes in the Men’s Team Championship Division.