The top seeds in the Under-19 Boys’ Teams Event at the European Youth Championships in Malmö Romania booked their place in the quarterfinals. In a surprising turn of events Romania will face Poland in the next stage a match many had anticipated would be the final clash.
Poland’s unexpected loss to Sweden in the group stage pushed them into the same part of the draw as Romania. Although Sweden occupied the lower half of the draw in the Round of 16 they failed to progress to the quarters losing to Slovakia in a dramatic duel.
Romania’s Andrei ISTRATE Darius MOVILEANU and Iulian CHIRITA overcame Slovenia’s Brin VOVK PETROVSKI Miha PODOBNIK and Matic COPAR in straight games.
Poland needed all five games to survive a fierce performance from last year’s Under-15 singles champion Tiago ABIODUN who won both his matches against Rafal FORMELA and Mateusz ZALEWSKI. However Pedro BRANDAO and Rafael KONG couldn’t match Tiago’s level allowing Poland to advance to the quarters.
Sweden engaged in a tough battle before losing to Slovakia. Isak ALFREDSSON gave Sweden a dream start by defeating Samuel PALUSEK 3-0 but Samuel ARPAS scored twice against ALFREDSSON 3-2 and against William BERGENBLOCK 3-0. FLORO beat David BJORKRYD in another five-game thriller.
“I feel incredible. Sweden was playing very well against us and they didn’t lose any matches in the group. We were playing in the second division because last year we fell down. This year we went match by match and this win is very sweet for us ” said ARPAS.
Asked about his last match that went the full distance against ALFREDSSON Samuel said “I think that neither of us played our best. It was more of a tactical match. Now we will meet Croatia and I really think we can beat them. We have three good players they have three good players. It’s 50/50 and we will see.”
The French team represented by Flavien COTON Nathan LAM and Antoine Jean Christian NOIRAULT prevailed against Austria’s Zhenlong LIU Petr HODINA and Tobias HOLD in straight matches. However the opening duel was challenging.
“I’m very happy with myself and our team against Austria. It was a good match. The first one we succeeded to win 3-2. This helped us. I started very well and succeeded to win 3-0 ” said NOIRAULT. Speaking about their goals in Sweden he added “We’re gonna look at our opponents then prepare the best we can. Hopefully we can reach the semifinals.”
