“Are not the China of Europe”: Boll completes unprecedented dominance at EM

Sunday June 27th 2021

“Are not the China of Europe”
Boll completes unprecedented dominance at EM

In 1998 Timo Boll played his first men’s table tennis championship – and 23 years later he is still one of the best on the continent. In Warsaw, the 40-year-old leads a German team that collects four out of five titles and is in top form for the Olympics.

Timo Boll and Co. ensured Chinese conditions in Europe with a record result less than four weeks before the Olympics at the European Table Tennis Championships in Warsaw. After a flood of medals with previously unreached four titles and three silver medals, the team of the German Table Tennis Association (DTTB) travels to the summer games in Tokyo with the now eight-time European Championship champion Boll as the lead wolf in a “gold rush mood”.

“Methuselah” Boll crowned his form improvement at the ghost games in the Torwar Arena with a 4-1 final victory over his national team mate and good friend Dimitrij Ovtcharov. Petrissa Solja’s 4: 1 in the women’s final against Shan Xiaona after the joint double triumph in another German final duel means that the two most important titles on the continent are in German hands for the first time in the 63-year history of the European Championship.

“Before the European Championship, I wasn’t sure whether I could be good enough to play that far ahead after my back problems in the spring. But that gives the Olympics just the right boost,” commented the 40-year-old record champion Boll after successfully defending his title his 20th European gold medal since 1998.

In the world rankings, the man from Düsseldorf, who had eliminated World Cup runner-up Mattias Falck (Sweden) 4-2 in the semifinals since 2018, before his sixth success in the seventh duel with Ovtcharov, is back in the top ten. For Tokyo, this means a favorable setting for Boll’s sixth hold after his first Olympic medal in individual.

“Analysis is more important than joy”

The empty trainer boxes in the three DTTB final duels were reminiscent of China’s dominance in international tournaments, as did the DTTB team’s collection of medals at this EM, which Dang Qiu / Nina Mittelham had ushered in with mixed gold. Never before had a nation returned home in tournament history, which dates back to 1958, with four titles in five individual competitions.

Nevertheless, DTTB sports director Richard Prause did not want his team to be dubbed “Europe’s Chinese”. “Our record after this really great European Championship may seem a bit like China’s superiority, but it’s much tighter in Europe,” said the ex-international.

Above all, however, with a view to the individual successes, Prause also spoke of a “successful positioning” after the first major competition since the outbreak of the corona pandemic. Boll, Ovtcharov and also the DTTB women “are there”, he noted with satisfaction: “We noticed that the engine had to get back into rhythm after such a long time, but we have happily shifted up to fifth gear can.”

Despite the impressive rain of gold, Prause sees a need for action for the Tokyo fine-tuning. The 53-year-old also thought of the dampers caused by the early defeats of the Olympic doubles with Boll and Patrick Franziska as well as the Tokyo medal candidate Franziska / Solja in mixed: “More important than the joy of our brilliant European Championship result is so close to the Olympics certainly the analysis in which areas it may be necessary to step up again and possibly to put in extra shifts. “