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In a social media poll, fans of the German Table Tennis League (TTBL) were able to vote for their “TTBL Player of the Month for December” at the end of the first half of the season. There were a total of five candidates to choose from (in alphabetical order): Fan Zhendong, Darko Jorgic (both 1. FC Saarbrücken-TT), Bastian Steger (TSV Bad Königshofen), Shunsuke Togami (TTF Liebherr Ochsenhausen), and Jo Yokotani (TTC OE Clarity Telefonie Systeme Bad Homburg). Fan received the most votes.

Fan Zhendong was able to celebrate Christmas in comfort with Timo Boll. In the days leading up to his visit to the family of his idol, who had gone from rival to friend, the Olympic champion delivered for 1. FC Saarbrücken-TT: with four victories in three important matches, Fan enabled the blue and blacks to enjoy a peaceful festive season after weeks and months that had been particularly turbulent off the court.

As a belated “Christmas present,” the TTBL community voted the Chinese player “Player of the Month for December” after his successes in the championship against Iulian Chirita (TTF Liebherr Ochsenhausen) and against Borgar Haug and Kanak Jha (both Borussia Düsseldorf) and his successful Champions League debut. The two-time world champion's first victory was so landslide compared to his competitors that, given the hype surrounding Fan so far, it can at least be assumed that there was massive participation in the vote by fans worldwide.

Fan certainly deserves the title. Since the start of his second “TTBL block,” the 28-year-old has taken on the leadership role in FCS coach Wang “Jimmy” Zhi's team, as hoped for from the outset. After the “most complete player of all time,” as Boll likes to describe the right-hander, taught his designated heir lesson after lesson at the National Games in China following his first TTBL matches, just as he did in his heyday, and confidently won the prestigious title, the former world number one returned with renewed self-confidence.

In the meantime, analysis of his unexpectedly bumpy TTBL debut had yielded several conclusions. On the one hand, the FCS management credited their superstar's three defeats in his first seven matches to adjustment problems, especially with the tables in Germany, and on the other hand, to a kind of general state of emergency among his opponents.

“You can tell that our opponents are playing very, very well and are always taking big risks with every ball,” said Saarbrücken captain Patrick Franziska, describing his observations, which team manager Nicolas Barrois shared: "Our opponents are perhaps two percent more motivated against us now, even more eager to cause an upset. Of course, they have nothing to lose against us and are playing freely. Then the atmosphere is just right and pumps so much adrenaline into their heads that some of our opponents have been playing way above their actual performance level for some time now."

Barrois is so convinced by Fan that the 36-year-old is already gradually considering extending their collaboration. “If Fan tells us two days before the deadline that he doesn't want to stay, then he won't stay,” Barrois said before the end-of-year game against Düsseldorf. “If he tells us a day before that he wants to stay, we'll do everything we can to keep him.”

Florian Manzke