Tuesday, November 23, 2021
“Roar in during the rally”
Boll serves in the table tennis developing country
Timo Boll has been playing table tennis at the highest level for more than 20 years. But there are still premieres for him too. Like the World Cup in the USA now. The German oldie points out curiosities. That he is one of the medal candidates is more than justified.
Even Timo Boll has never experienced this in his more than 20-year professional career: This Tuesday, a table tennis world championship in the USA begins in Houston for the first time. In sharp contrast to its geopolitical rival from China, the United States is still a developing country in this sport. In Boll’s own experience, this is also expressed, for example, in the fact that the enthusiastic spectators “sometimes shout into the middle of the rally”.
The Americans got the bid for this World Cup anyway. On the one hand, to open up a sports-loving market. And on the other hand, to commemorate the “ping-pong diplomacy” exactly 50 years ago. At that time, the Americans and Chinese relieved their tension with the help of table tennis. First two players from both countries became friends at the 1971 World Cup. After that, the leaders of both countries met for the first time.
In Houston, the European champion Boll is one of the medal candidates simply because several big names are missing in the individual: The Olympic third Dimitrij Ovtcharov from his own team is not there because of an ankle injury. Defending champion Ma Long and former world number one Xu Xin were not nominated by the Chinese to give some younger players a chance.
“Heroes of Cluj” will be there again
This sounds somewhat familiar to the Germans. Because at the beginning of October the men and women each won the title at the European Team Championship, although stars like Ovtcharov, Boll, Petrissa Solja and Han Ying did not play, albeit of their own accord. The “Heroes of Cluj” were then called Patrick Franziska and Nina Mittelham. Your association brought the second big emotional story after Ovtcharov’s partly epic appearances at the Olympic Games shortly before. And they themselves now want to confirm these performances at the once again significantly higher World Cup level.
“It was super nice for me to win the European Championship and also the European Top 16 tournament. Precisely because you could see: The others didn’t play – and you can still rely on me,” said the 24-year-old Mittelham. “I have shown that I am not only a follower, but also belong to the best. People have always said that I play a little inconsistently and that I often cannot perform well. That is why this success has given me a lot of self-confidence.”
Mittelham and Franziska are at the start in Houston in singles, doubles and mixed. Since more Chinese, Japanese or South Koreans (five per country) play in the singles competition at a World Cup than in the Olympics (three per country), the chances of going far are naturally greater in doubles and mixed games. Patrick Franziska won the bronze medal in mixed at the 2019 World Cup together with Petrissa Solja. In doubles, the world title even seemed possible at the time, until his partner Timo Boll woke up with a strong fever on the day of the quarter-finals.
“We already said then that we would attack again. We will do that in Houston now,” said 29-year-old Franziska. “Team EM and Top 16 went perfectly for me. Now I’m very well prepared, especially because I’ve played so many matches recently.”