Other Events | 30 Apr 2015

FRANZISKA joines BOLL in World’s top

In The Round of 16 in the QOROS 2015 World Table Tennis Championships in Suzhou Marcos FREITAS of Portugal, World’s no. 8 suffered by the hands of World’s no 56 Patrick FRANZISKA of Germany. “I am unhappy with my complete performance. I was slow, my retur

In The Round of 16 in the QOROS 2015 World Table Tennis Championships in Suzhou Marcos FREITAS of Portugal, World’s no. 8 suffered by the hands of World’s no 56 Patrick FRANZISKA of Germany. “I am unhappy with my complete performance. I was slow, my return of service was not good and Patrick, on the other side played very well. He kept me under pressure from the beginning,” said FREITAS.

FRANZISKA was delighted after the victory. “We played against each other three or four times before, but I never beat him before. Today I attacked him, I played from the corners; he was not sure from which side the ball will come.”

FRANZISKA radiate with self-confidence. “Match against MENGEL was a turning point. Then I realize I can do something important here. I felt good during the practice and I was relaxed and that is always a good sign.”

He will meet KOU Lei of Ukraine in the next round match. KOU beat Adam PATTANTYUS of Hungary. “Adam and I played many times before and he usually beat me, but today he did not play at his level,” said KOU.

Vladimir SAMSONOV overcame Joao GERALDO of Portugal. “Joao risked a lot, but he made a lot of mistakes as well. At some point he just attacked too hard,” said SAMSONOV, who will play against ZHANG Jike of China in next round. ”I beat him only once in Euro Asia series, but that is completely different situation. All I can do is to be active, to attack and to open the game. I can only create the chances with good attacks.”

Another member of the European Team’s champions suffered defeat. Joao MONTEIRO stretched Timo BOLL to full distance and in nail biting finish lost the encounter.

MA Long of China halted the progress of Panagiotis GIONIS of Greece. “I think Panagiotis should believe more in himself. He is playing good here, but I guess their last encounter when MA has beat him easily made him less confident,” said coach Konstantinos VATSAKLIS.

Last time those two meets were at the Team ‘s World Championships in Germany. “If there was anybody else but him on the other side of the net I would have won it. I felt great here and I am really satisfied with my performance. I had my chances even today. I had a lead in the opening set; even a game ball, but I failed to take advantage of it. I lost on my mistakes,” explained GIONIS.

Liam PITCHFORD of England suffered by the hands of JOO Saehyuk of Korea in fibe games, whilst Jonathan GROTH of Denmark lost against WONG Chun Ting of Hong Kong in straight games. Alexander SHIBAEV of Russia played six games against XU Xin before he lost his encounter and GAO Ning of Singapore proved too strong for CHEN Weixing of Austria

SHIBAEV was 2:0 in the lead, before World’s no. two recovered to win. “Today was my match. I should have won it. He was struggling to find the answer for my game. XU was confused. And I lost the match that I have already won. Maybe I over-thought some things. I played well and I consider that I lost through my own efforts. He did not do anything to win. I simply missed my hits.”

CHEN Weixing admitted he made too many mistakes against GAO. “We played before so I knew what to expect. I thought about the tactics day before and decided not to attack. Unfortunately, GAO also changed his tactics so in the middle of the match I was not sure what to do…” said CHEN.

In Men’s Doubles Event XU Xin CHN and ZHANG Jike of China will meet LEE Sangsu and SEO Hyundeok of Korea whilst in other semis Chinese pairings of FAN Zhendong and ZHOU Yu  will play against Kenta MATSUDAIRA and Koki NIWA Koki of Japan.