Greek player Ioannis SGOUROPOULOS is seeded at the position no. three in the Men’s Singles Event at the 021 GAZPROM European Under 21 Championships in Spa. The winner of the title in Gondomar in 2019 is coming fresh from the success in Champions League with TTV Neu Ulm – they reached the quarterfinal.
“I am little bit tired from the matches in the Champions League and the matches in Bundesliga but for sure I am in good shape. I am also very happy for Neu Ulm’s result. We showed good team spirit and we have really good guidance by MIZUNOV. When we saw the draw and FAKEL Gazprom Orenburg and KS Dartom Bogoria Grodzisk Mazowiecki in our Group we were sceptic but we fought hard ” explained SGOUROPOULOS.
SGOUROPOULOS beat LIN Yun-Ju and Panagiotis GIONIS last week.
“Against GIONIS it was really hard one. Past seven years we train together. Since 2015 we are in the same team. He knows everything about me and I know everything about him…I was under great stress before the match. However it is finish now and we are still friends ” said Ioannis laughing.
The list of the participants in Spa is impressive. Top seed is Cristian PLETEA followed by Rares SIPOS. Vladimir SIDORENKO is just one place below Ioannis.
“Russia’s players are dangerous Romania’ toos but the French line up is also very strong with Bastien REMBERT Irvin BERTRAND…There are a lot of players who can clinch the title. “
In the doubles SGOUROPOULOS will play with SIDORENKO.
“We played only once before. It was three or four years ago and it did not end well. We lost in the opening round. I hope it will be better here.”