T There is news again from the world of table tennis. There is also a competition devised by the ITTF, namely the ITTF Doubles World Cup, which is scheduled to take place for the first time in 2027, the location still unknown. As if the calendar of the professionals wasn’t full enough already!
But it seems to be working, and money is apparently available. Even the trend among professionals to step back at club level in favor of an international career is reversing again. Benedikt Duda has signed again with his hometown club, and World Cup winner Hugo Calderano has returned from club-free status; he will play next season for 1. FC Saarbrücken.
And he has to witness — hot news next! — that the current Olympic champion and former world champion Fan Zhedong has decided to play another year in the Bundesliga, but not for Saarbrücken, rather for Borussia Düsseldorf. Timo Boll — isn’t he actually the “brand ambassador” for Borussia Dortmund? — is said to have been partly responsible for this decision.
Anyway, for Borussia Düsseldorf, the club that is said to be the FC Bayern of table tennis, this is a coup; the downward trend after Boll’s retirement seems to have been halted. It will be exciting to see how the championship race is decided this summer. So, whether Fan ends up in a moral dilemma with Saarbrücken if they should meet Düsseldorf.
Power and the Maintenance of Power
The German Bundesliga seems to stand up to the supremacy of the WTT (World Table Tennis) with its tournament circus. This is because here the players earn money, while there they have to front the costs and, with early elimination, may end up bearing the expenses themselves. In tennis there is no club-based safety net anymore: a professional once calculated that you must already be a millionaire to become a millionaire; for travel, support, etc., you already spend a good one million euros before you can start to recoup the money.
Elsewhere, for example in Austria, the table tennis league operation is suffering. Here the scheduling and lineup distortions are lamented; the already second-rate squads clearly do not cover the costs. Let’s see where the trend goes — more sponsorship? Or an international super league?
On top of that, Austria faces completely different problems, namely a MeToo-like or rather an abuse case (an intrusive coach, the victim a minor), whose investigation has been seriously delayed, while consequences have been pursued only half-heartedly. In the ÖTTZ, the association’s magazine, which still treats sports journalism in the spirit of the 1980s, there is precisely nothing about the matter.
And yet: after the umpteenth push by Standard and — aha! — the announcement by the Austrian Ministry of Sport to cut the federation’s funds, there finally has been movement in the matter: after ÖTTV Vice President Liu Jia, the president Wolfgang Gotschke has now resigned; the rest of the board remains silent or threatens with legal countermeasures.
Already strange how strongly officials in honorary positions cling to their posts. What do they really gain from it?
