International

The German Table Tennis Bundesliga (TTBL) is basking in the glory of three medals following the World Team Championships in London. The Japanese players Shunsuke Togami (TTF Liebherr Ochsenhausen) and Hiroto Shinozuka (ASC Grünwettersbach) are bringing home team silver from the UK, a year after their World Championship gold in the doubles, whilst Feng Yi-Hsin (TTC Zugbrücke Grenzau) repeated Taiwan’s third-place finish from 2024 with the national team.

Kirill Gerassimenko also caused a stir on the international stage. Werder Bremen’s top player from Kazakhstan, the upcoming World Championships host nation, impressed just a few weeks before the Liebherr TTBL Final4 on 30/ 31 May in Frankfurt, not only as a frequent player with the second-highest number of matches, but also, with just one defeat across all tournament stages, boasted the second-best record of all World Championship participants behind world number one Wang Chuqin from the successful defending champions China, who remained unbeaten in all nine singles matches.

Consequently, Gerassimenko was also the most successful TTBL professional at the title matches marking the 100th anniversary of the World Championships. Behind the 29-year-old, Jonathan Groth (TTC RhönSprudel Fulda-Maberzell) achieved the second-best haul for Denmark with five wins in six singles matches. Iulian Chirita (Ochsenhausen) won four out of five matches. With a plus of three matches, Sweden’s Anton Källberg (Borussia Düsseldorf/6:3) and Togami (5:2) took the remaining places.

Below the four teams on the podium, nine other TTBL stars and their teams still managed to reach the quarter-finals. The largest group was the German national team, comprising Dang Qiu (Düsseldorf), Benedikt Duda (TTC Schwalbe Bergneustadt), Patrick Franziska (1. FC Saarbrücken), Dimitrij Ovtcharov (Fulda-Maberzell) and Andre Bertelsmeier (TSV Bad Königshofen). Also in the round of the top eight teams were Källberg alongside his Swedish compatriots Kristian Karlsson (Borussia Dortmund) and Mattias Karlsson (Bremen), as well as the Brazilian Leonardo Iizuka (Ochsenhausen).

Following the group stage and the first knockout round, 14 other TTBL stars, including Gerassimenko, were through to the round of 16. After Germany and alongside Sweden, Romania fielded the most Bundesliga players at this stage, with the trio of Eduard Ionescu (Saarbrücken), Ovidiu Ionescu (Post SV Mühlhausen) and Chirita. Denmark (Groth, Anders Lind/Borussia Dortmund), Croatia (Filip Zeljko/TSV Bad Königshofen, Ivor Ban/TTC OE Clarity Telefonie-Systeme Bad Homburg), Austria (Daniel Habesohn/Bad Königshofen, Andreas Levenko/Ochsenhausen), England (Tom Jarvis/Grünwettersbach, Sam Walker/Grenzau) and Portugal (Marcos Freitas/Mühlhausen, Tiago Apolonia/Grünwettersbach).

Florian Manzke
Featured image (above): Kirill Gerassimenko (Photo: Anastasiia Hrytsenko)