Verschiedenes

In a social media poll, fans of the Table Tennis Bundesliga (TTBL) voted for their “TTBL Player of the Month for October”, with international performances playing a key role in their decision. Out of five nominees, Wim Verdonschot (Borussia Dortmund) came out on top, ahead of Hugo Calderano and Patrick Franziska (both 1. FC Saarbrücken-TT), as well as Anton Källberg and Dang Qiu (both Borussia Düsseldorf).

A new name has been added to the list of “TTBL Players of the Month”: Wim Verdonschot (Borussia Dortmund) can rightly be considered the big breakthrough of the current TTBL season. Having already attracted plenty of attention the previous month with an impressive winning streak in the Bundesliga and narrowly missed out on the award, the young German continued his upward trajectory in October with equally impressive performances on the international stage.

At the China Smash in Beijing, Verdonschot made headlines by reaching the round of 16 at the two-million-dollar tournament, outshining several of Germany's top players along the way. After an almost flawless run through qualifying, winning 9:1 in sets across three matches, the 1.90-metre-tall player once again got the better of three-time Europe Top 16 winner Darko Jorgic in the first round. Having repeated his cup upset against the Slovenian from 2025, Verdonschot also defeated defensive specialist Yang Wang (Slovakia), before his run came to an end against Feng Yi-Hin (Chinese Taipei) in the battle for a place in the quarter-finals.

As a reward, the Berlin-born player climbed from 59th to 40th in the world rankings, marking a new career high. His previous best ranking had been 57th. At the European Championships in Ljubljana, held immediately after the China Smash, Verdonschot also made an impressive debut, qualifying for the main draw at the first attempt.

His performances in Beijing were undoubtedly a major factor behind the TTBL community voting the Borussia Dortmund youngster as October's winner. In a particularly close contest, Verdonschot narrowly prevailed over Sweden's Anton Källberg, who had won silver medals in both the singles and doubles events in Slovenia, as well as WTT Champions Montpellier finalist Patrick Franziska.

Verdonschot himself sees the fans' vote as further motivation to continue on his current path: “This award means a lot to me. It is further confirmation that I have managed to perform at a good level over the past few months, and I'm absolutely delighted that the fans see it the same way. I'm really happy about that.”

Florian Manzke