ETTU is inviting all the coaches to attend the Annual Coaching Conference to be held in Vila Nova de Gaia (POR) from the 19th – 21st November 2022. The lecturers are ITTF high-performance elite coach Massimo COSTANTINI Buterfly Sponsoring Coach and former Japan national team player Aya UMEMURA and Portugal’s head coach Ricardo OLIVEIRA. Entries shall be sent to Miguel Moura (FPTM dt@fptm.pt) with cc: Ana Ivošević (ETTU ana.antic.ettu@gmail.com) not later than Friday 4th November 2022. Please note that the attendees are encouraged to send their questions to the lecturers in advance during the time of registration. More information please find in attached Prospectus. All relevant documents you can find here.
Annual Coaching Conference in Vila Nova de Gaia
ETTU is inviting all the coaches to attend the Annual Coaching Conference to be held in Vila Nova de Gaia (POR) from the 19th – 21st November 2022. The lecturers are ITTF high-performance elite coach Massimo COSTANTINI Buterfly Sponsoring Coach and former Japan national team player Aya UMEMURA and Portugal’s head coach Ricardo OLIVEIRA. Entries shall be sent to Miguel Moura (FPTM dt@fptm.pt) with cc: Ana Ivošević (ETTU ana.antic.ettu@gmail.com) not later than Friday 4th November 2022. Please note that the attendees are encouraged to send their questions to the lecturers in advance during the time of registration. More information please find in attached Prospectus. All relevant documents you can find here.
8 Europeans candidates for the ITTF Athletes’ Commission
The list of the 25 candidates for the International Table Tennis Federation’s Athletes’ Commission is unveiled. At the list there are 10 Europeans. There are 6 athletes from Europe who are candidates for the 8 positions of Athletes two Europeans in group of four for two positions of Para-Athletes Standings and two candidates in Wheelchair Para-Athletes. Melissa TAPPER AUS Oceania Stefan FEGERL AUT Europe VEGA MAGAÑA Maria Paulina CHI Americas LIU Shiwen CHN Asia HANFFOU Sarah CMR Africa PRIMORAC Zoran CRO Europe ASSAR Omar EGY Africa DVORAK Galia ESP Europe LOEUILLETTE Stephanie FRA Europe ACHANTA Sharath Kamal IND Asia ALAMIYAN DARONKOLAEI Noshad IRI Asia ABO YAMAN Zaid JOR Asia ISHIKAWA Kasumi JPN Asia JANG Woo Jin KOR Asia MADRID MANTILLA Marcos MEX Americas RIOS Daniely PUR Americas SAMARA Elizabeta ROU Europe PERSSON Jon SWE Europe LAWSON-GAIZER Fessou TOG Africa ZHAO Shuai CHN Asia SEOANE ALCARAZ Alberto ESP Europe MOHAMMADI Fatemeh IRI Asia VAN ZON Kelly NED Europe TAPOLA Aino FIN Europe LUNDBACK Ingela SWE Europe According to regulations campaigning is now open and voting takes place from Monday 7 to Sunday 13 November. The successful candidates will be announced on Monday 14th November. A total of 10 places are open for the commission serving a term of four years the criteria is as follows: Eight athletes who have competed in at least one World Championships or World Team Championships since 2014; each continent – Africa Asia Americas Europe Oceania – is eligible for at least one representative. Both genders must be represented. Two Para athletes one standing and one wheelchair who have competed in at least one Para World Championships since 2014. The registration period for wheelchair para-athletes candidates will be extended by one week. All members of the Athletes’ Commission will be invited to the forthcoming ITTF Summit in December in Amman Jordan. At the summit the commission along with IOC Athletes’ Commission member RYU Seung-Min will elect two chairs to sit on the ITTF Executive Committee. For the first time the two chairs will be one man and one woman to ensure gender parity. Voting shall be exercised on-line through the means facilitated to each of the electors directly by the independent voting company LUMI. In case of a tie the candidate from the continent with the lower number of elected candidates will be declared winner. In case of a further tie the candidate from the gender with the lower number of elected candidates will be declared winner. If ties cannot be resolved the election committee will open a second round of voting which will last 3 (three) days for the purpose of resolving the tie and declare the winner/s. Full information about the Athletes’ Commission election can be found here.
8 Europeans candidates for the ITTF Athletes’ Commission
The list of the 25 candidates for the International Table Tennis Federation’s Athletes’ Commission is unveiled. At the list there are 10 Europeans. There are 6 athletes from Europe who are candidates for the 8 positions of Athletes two Europeans in group of four for two positions of Para-Athletes Standings and two candidates in Wheelchair Para-Athletes. Melissa TAPPER AUS Oceania Stefan FEGERL AUT Europe VEGA MAGAÑA Maria Paulina CHI Americas LIU Shiwen CHN Asia HANFFOU Sarah CMR Africa PRIMORAC Zoran CRO Europe ASSAR Omar EGY Africa DVORAK Galia ESP Europe LOEUILLETTE Stephanie FRA Europe ACHANTA Sharath Kamal IND Asia ALAMIYAN DARONKOLAEI Noshad IRI Asia ABO YAMAN Zaid JOR Asia ISHIKAWA Kasumi JPN Asia JANG Woo Jin KOR Asia MADRID MANTILLA Marcos MEX Americas RIOS Daniely PUR Americas SAMARA Elizabeta ROU Europe PERSSON Jon SWE Europe LAWSON-GAIZER Fessou TOG Africa ZHAO Shuai CHN Asia SEOANE ALCARAZ Alberto ESP Europe MOHAMMADI Fatemeh IRI Asia VAN ZON Kelly NED Europe TAPOLA Aino FIN Europe LUNDBACK Ingela SWE Europe According to regulations campaigning is now open and voting takes place from Monday 7 to Sunday 13 November. The successful candidates will be announced on Monday 14th November. A total of 10 places are open for the commission serving a term of four years the criteria is as follows: Eight athletes who have competed in at least one World Championships or World Team Championships since 2014; each continent – Africa Asia Americas Europe Oceania – is eligible for at least one representative. Both genders must be represented. Two Para athletes one standing and one wheelchair who have competed in at least one Para World Championships since 2014. The registration period for wheelchair para-athletes candidates will be extended by one week. All members of the Athletes’ Commission will be invited to the forthcoming ITTF Summit in December in Amman Jordan. At the summit the commission along with IOC Athletes’ Commission member RYU Seung-Min will elect two chairs to sit on the ITTF Executive Committee. For the first time the two chairs will be one man and one woman to ensure gender parity. Voting shall be exercised on-line through the means facilitated to each of the electors directly by the independent voting company LUMI. In case of a tie the candidate from the continent with the lower number of elected candidates will be declared winner. In case of a further tie the candidate from the gender with the lower number of elected candidates will be declared winner. If ties cannot be resolved the election committee will open a second round of voting which will last 3 (three) days for the purpose of resolving the tie and declare the winner/s. Full information about the Athletes’ Commission election can be found here.
Early bird extended for EVC2023 in Sandefjord
EVC2023 will be held from 25. June to 1. July 2023 at Oslofjord Convention Center in Sandefjord Norway. Numbers are rising day by day and the limit is set to 4000 participants. Now the organisers have decided to extend the early bird discount with one month. “We are satisfied with the entries eight months before the event ” event director Karl Borre REITE says. “We initially needed to extend the early bird scheme with a few days for technical reasons. However it seems that “some early birds hasn’t woken up yet” and we want more participants to benefit from the discount. The solution is to give everyone some extra weeks to secure their place in the event.” EVC2023 is a “One Village-One Venue”-event held on the resort Oslofjord Convention Center. Accomodation with breakfast lunch and dinner is offered at the resort as well as activities and entertainment on site. Accomodation and food is fully refundable until a week before the event making it safe to book now. All details entry system booking of accomodation and food sightseeing and airport transfers can be found on www.evc2023.com
Early bird extended for EVC2023 in Sandefjord
EVC2023 will be held from 25. June to 1. July 2023 at Oslofjord Convention Center in Sandefjord Norway. Numbers are rising day by day and the limit is set to 4000 participants. Now the organisers have decided to extend the early bird discount with one month. “We are satisfied with the entries eight months before the event ” event director Karl Borre REITE says. “We initially needed to extend the early bird scheme with a few days for technical reasons. However it seems that “some early birds hasn’t woken up yet” and we want more participants to benefit from the discount. The solution is to give everyone some extra weeks to secure their place in the event.” EVC2023 is a “One Village-One Venue”-event held on the resort Oslofjord Convention Center. Accomodation with breakfast lunch and dinner is offered at the resort as well as activities and entertainment on site. Accomodation and food is fully refundable until a week before the event making it safe to book now. All details entry system booking of accomodation and food sightseeing and airport transfers can be found on www.evc2023.com
The action in October concluded in the CREPS of Pays de la Loire
The third Eurotalents u-13 camp of the year 2023 was held last week from October 22nd until 29th at the CREPS of Pays de la Loire a high-Performance centre part of the ETTU’s Network of Training Centres. On this occasion 16 u-13 players from 10 different countries met in Nantes where they trained under the direction of Guillaume SIMONIN Stephane HUCLIEZ Clémence BOUTEFEU and Christian DANCIU as a physical training coach. Galia DVORAK the ETTU Special Project Manager visited the centre and delivered the certificate of adherence to the network to Aude REYGADE the director of the CREPS. “The CREPS of Pays de la Loire is a high-performance centre of a very high standard and for the ETTU it is a huge asset to have them as part of our network and as organisers of this Eurotalents u-13 Camp. The level and intensity of the training have been very high and from my side I want to congratulate and thank the professionalism of the FFTT technical staff ” stated Galia DVORAK. This training camp closes a very busy month for the ETTU development program in which a Eurotalents Under 15 / Under 17 camp was held in Havirov (CZE) the final Selection Camp took place in Otocec (SLO) and there were several activities part of the ETTU National Assistance Program organised in Montenegro Jersey and Denmark.
HARIMOTO halted OVTCHAROV in semis of the WTT Cup Finals Xinxiang 2022
Japanese in outstanding form Tomokazu HARIMOTO defeated Olympic bronze medalists Dimitrij OVTCHAROV in the semi-finals of the WTT Cup Finals Xinxiang 2022. It is the third German ace in a row after HARIMOTO had already beaten record European champion Timo BOLL in the quarter-finals the day before and in the round of 16 on Thursday the World’s no. 13 Patrick FRANZISKA OVTCHAROV had consolation in 37 500 dollars prize money and 525 world ranking points but much more importantly with yesterday’s quarter-final triumph over World’s number one FAN Zhendong (China). In the final on Sunday HARIMOTO meets either China’s Olympic champion MA Long or his compatriot WANG Chuqin. In the women’s final two players from China will face each other: World number one SUN Yingsha will face either Olympic champion CHEN Meng or World champion WANG Manyu. Former world number one Dimitrij Ovtcharov ungrudgingly acknowledged his opponent’s performance: “My respect: HARIMOTO played flawlessly and built up a lot of pressure with his strong shots. I’m actually someone who is very strong in the longer rallies but I have them today almost all of them lost. That also has an effect on my self-confidence in my serve and return game.” The outcome of the more than three-week trip to Asia by the Olympic bronze medalist from Tokyo and London to the WTT tournaments in Macao and Xinxiang is extremely positive: “The Champions and the Cup Finals were two great tournaments in terms of the cast there is a world-class opponent after the others it’s amazing training. It’s great for me to have played so many matches against such good players. I’ll learn a lot from both wins and losses. Above all yesterday’s win over FAN Zhendong showed me that after as before anything is possible and gives me a lot of confidence. If I keep working hard on myself I can keep improving my level and then keep it in the tournament for a longer period of time. Then I can win against Harimoto again in the future even if I did today didn’t stand a chance.”
Dima OVTCHAROV beat World champion FAN Zhendong
Dimitrij OVTCHAROV of Germany has reached the semifinals of the $1 million WTT Cup Finals in Xinxiang (October 27th to 30th) with a 3:2 triumph over World number one and World champion FAN Zhendong. In the duel for entry into the final OVTCHAROV is now waiting for the Japanese Tomokazu HARIMOTO on Saturday who had previously prevailed in his quarter-final match against Timo BOLL of Germany. With his entry into the semi-finals OVTCHAROV has at least 37 500 dollars in prize money and 525 world ranking points on his credit side Timo BOLL has 30 000 dollars and 265 valuable points for the ITTF listing as a consolation. A good year after his injury which after a foot operation and intermittent setbacks when re-entering the training process could only be shelved eight months later in June 2022 with the start at the WTT Lima Contender Dimitrij OVTCHAROV has his last in an impressive way today provided evidence of his return to the top of the World. The Olympic bronze medalist from Tokyo and London celebrated table tennis at the very highest level with 4:11 11:6 11:8 7:11 11:6 over world champion FAN Zhendong. For the 11th player in the World rankings it was the third win in his ninth duel with the number one in the world but the first success over the Chinese in his home country. For Dimitrij OVTCHAROV after months of patiently working towards an outstanding result the victory was a source of satisfaction: “It was a very good game for me today. I have a very strong dominant backhand and I think I managed to block it a few times but above all I am happy that after recovering from my injury I was able to show that I am finally back among the best in the world.” In the semifinals on Saturday OVTCHAROV meets Tomokazu HARIMOTO who is in excellent shape and against whom the statistics show a 4:4 record. The last two duels in 2021 in the semi-finals of the team competition at the Olympic Games and in the semi-finals of the WTT Star Contender in Doha in the same year ended narrowly for the Japanese. Before that Timo BOLL was eliminated in the quarter-finals. With 11:8 11:4 12:10 Tomokazu HARIMOTO like yesterday in his Round of 16 match against Patrick FRANZISKA rarely gave Timo BOLL who started in brilliant form the chance to take the initiative and control the game. Japan’s fifth in the world rankings who defeated both world champion FAN Zhendong and Olympic champion MA Long in the team World Cup semi-final against China three weeks ago often scored directly against the record European champion with his extremely aggressive return and the first ball after his serve or put Timo Boll at least immediately under immense pressure. “He played very aggressively. He was particularly strong with the forehand and he did what he wanted with my serve. His serves were also difficult for me as a left-hander see. He’s already very strong in form ” said BOLL. World No.3 Truls MOREGARD lost in the quarterfinals against China’s WANG Chuqin (8:11 3:11 13:15). He had a chance in the game three by winning six of the first eight points but before long finds himself up against the ropes. The World No.3 saves three match points and has two game points of his own but the day would belong to WANG Chuqin.
Away wins for Czech Republic and Luxembourg
The matches in A Groups at the 2023 European Teams Championships Stage one continued tonight with the duels in Women’s Event. In Novi Sad Serbia lost to Luxembourg. As it was expected NI Xia Lian was at the top of her game and she recorded wins against Izabela LUPULESKU and Sabina SURJAN. However there were no lack of upsets in that match. In the opening match Sabina SURJAN ranked at the World rankings at the position no. 110 overcame Sarah DE NUTTE who is placed at the position no. 68. Serbia had a dream start with that victory but they faced rude awakening with the Andrea TODOROVIC’S defeat against Tessy GONDERINGER. Andrea is no. 121 in the World whilst Tessi is no. 302. “At the beginning I had some troubles getting into the match. I was down 0-1 and 5-9 but somehow I managed to turn the set around and win it. I think that was an important moment that gave me more confidence and helped me to find my game. From the third set on I started to play more focused and with the clear strategy. This worked out quite well so that at the end I managed to win 3:1. All in all I‘m very happy with my performance today and I‘m glad that I could help the team to win ” explained Tessy GONDERINGER. Italy also suffered four matches defeat at home soil. Czech Republic had a good start after Zdena BLASKOVA World’s no. 244 beat Debora VIVARELLI ranked at the position no. 161. Hana MATELOVA World’s no. 27 prevailed against World’s no. 70 Giorgia PICCOLIN. Nikoleta STEFANOVA was the only player to score for Italy. She beat Marketa SEVCIKOVA before MATELOVA finished the match with the victory over Nicole ARILA. “We started very with BLASKOVA’s win. The following match was very important for us. Hana MATELOVA lost to Giorgia PICCOLIN at the European Championships. Today she showed a very good performance. Hana received very well. In the third match Nikoleta STEFANOVA overcame in straight games Marketa SEVCIKOVA to open the challenge again. In the fourth singles Italy changed Vivarelli with Nicole ARLIA. Hana began very quickly in the first set and in the second she was leading 7-3 and lost. In the next two sets however she was very confident and won 3-1. This was our first match in the group with Italy and Portugal and we are very happy of the result here in Bolzano” said Coach Petr NEDOMA. Italy’s coach Elena TIMINA said: “I said before that the result would depend on the form of the day and a little bit of luck. Both of them were in favor of Czech Republic because their number 1 MATELOVA was in the best possible shape today and on the other side we did not guess the line-up in the way I would prefer. PICCOLIN and ARLIA made a good fight against MATELOVA even if she played very well. I believe we can beat her as well and against n. 2 we can do better. I am very happy that Nikoleta STEFANOVA gave us the first point winning for the national team after many years on the Italian ground. She showed her class and her level. She is very important for the team. It was a pity that we did not reach 2-2 because I would have liked to see Giorgia against BLASKOVA. Today Czech Republic was better but it does not mean that the next time will be the same”. Slovakia scored at home soil in Bratislava. They beat Netherlands 3:1. Barbora BALAZOVA overcame Tanja HELLE but world’s no 48 did it much harder than the rankings of her adversary predicts. World’s no. 330 forced Barbora to go full distance. Ema LABOSOVA lost five games match against Shuohan MEN but Tatiana KUKULKOVA gave Slovakia the lead once again. She beat Sanne DE HOOP. BALAZOVA overcame MEN in the last duel. Turkiye overcame Hungary 3:1 in Istanbul. The back-bone of the team’s success was Sibel ALTINKAYA World’s no. 92. She beat Georgina POTA ranked at the position no. 63 and Dora MADARASZ placed at the position no. 76 at World Rankings. World’s no. 215 Ozge YILMAZ beat Dora as well. Mercedes NAGYVARADI was the only player to score for Hungary. She overcame Simay KULAKCEKEN.
