Thierry CABRERA at work to seek Jean-Michel SAIVE's heiress out

22/01/2010 - Belgium’s Thierry CABRERA was a part of successful stories in biggest European clubs. From German Dusseldorf, to French Levallois, Austria’s Niederösterreich, French Hennebont and of course Belgium’s Charleroi CABRERA made a mark in Old Continent’s club scene. He wore national shirt for 275 times, won the medal at World Championships, World Cup, six Euro Cups and won more than 30 titles in France, Belgium and Austria, as well as two titles at pro tours during 25 years of playing.

At the Europe Youth Top-10 in Topolcany, CABRERA is in role that he accepted four seasons ago - a coach of Flanders TTA. Speaking about recent years CABRERA noticed improvement in the youth categories. “Couple years ago everything depended on service and one ball, and now situation is much better. Now the players cannot be successful if they have only one shot. Especially with the new rules, with the ball that goes slower, it is necessary for players to have all strokes. Now we need complete players,” explained CABRERA.

However, the comparison with the “old times”, couple of decades ago was inevitable. “Main difference is that the juniors now very rarely can beat the seniors. That was nothing strange 20 – 30 years ago, but of course, we talk about the generation of WALDNER, APPELGREN, PRIMORAC, LUPULESKU….” , CABRERA said.

Coach described the competition in Topolcany this year as leveled. “There are no favorites here. Maybe Patrick FRANZISKA outstands a little, but he will also faced some challenge. Basically everybody can beat everybody.”

Coach CABRERA traveled to Slovakia despite the fact that he had heavy accident and that he suffered triple break of his leg. “I went under surgery three and the half weeks ago, but have to be here now,” said CABRERA with the smile.

Belgium has one representative in the competition in Slovakia: Lauric JEAN. He started the competition with the heavy seven games duel against Pavel SIRUCEK in which he suffered defeat. “When I compare our budget to some other countries, we are doing just fine. We have very good organization. In our center players have very good conditions for play. They practice two times per day, go to school, have classes, and we have excellent coach who work with them on physical preparation, fizio…Our biggest problem is lack of support from sponsors since we do not have stars like Jean Michael SAVE is any more. He is leaving the scene and there is no replacement yet,” explained Thierry CABRERA.

(by Milica NIKOLIC, EWT)

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Photo: Photo: Belgian coach Thierry CABRERA (Photo Tomas SEREDA)

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