At the European Championships in Munich, table tennis grandmaster Timo Boll is thrown out of the tournament against his Bundesliga colleague Dang Qiu. But the bitter bankruptcy is not the only problem: there are big question marks over the arrival of Boll and Co. for the World Cup in China in October.
There are question marks behind Timo Boll and Co.’s arrival at the Table Tennis Team World Championships in Chengdu, China (September 30th to October 9th). Vice President Heike Ahlert from the German Table Tennis Association (DTTB) and DTTB Sports Director Richard Prause confirmed the SID problems caused by exorbitantly increased flight costs. The validity of corona regulations for foreign participants also seems unclear.
Meanwhile, defending champion Boll has been dethroned at the European Championships in Munich. The 41-year-old surprisingly lost 4-0 to his Düsseldorf Bundesliga colleague Dang Qiu in the quarter-finals. The first German national table tennis player with a penholder grip will play against Mattias Falck or Truls Möregardh (both Swedes) in the afternoon (from 4.50 p.m.) for a place in the final. Dang has already secured bronze. Record European champion Boll went into the German duel as the clear favorite. After the trembling victory against the Pole Samuel Kulczycki at the start, he had improved, but against Dang (25), whom Boll had described as the “first real touchstone”, it was over. The preparation of the eight-time champion had been severely affected by the late effects of a broken rib.
Hopes are now pinned on the World Cup in China. But does it work with the journey? “We presented the problem of costs to our world association ITTF,” said Vice President Ahlert on the fringes of the European Championship. One of the few scheduled flights to the World Cup country currently costs around 8,000 euros per person. “That,” Ahlert clarifies, “could not be financed for other associations apart from the DTTB.” As a solution, the ITTF offers charter flights from Dubai or Singapore. Prause urges, “Hope we know more by the end of EM.”
The 54-year-old also considers a conceivable downsizing of the 20-strong DTTB entourage to be the worst option: “We’re talking about a world championship, which is the most important competition after the Olympics. It’s our claim that our athletes have the best possible support can compete.” Debates are also ongoing over details of China’s stringent zero-Covid strategy. “It may be that foreigners have to arrive much earlier because of the quarantine and cannot prepare properly,” says Ahlert. According to Prause’s information, the precautionary isolation after entry is only mandatory for passengers of scheduled flights: “This is probably not required for charter flights.”
