European Table Tennis Championships with 27 TTBL pros
The European Table Tennis Championships in Linz will be a rendezvous for Bundesliga stars. The TTBL will be represented at the individual title matches by the hunted champion Dang Qiu (Düsseldorf) and 26 other professionals.
With every fifth participant in the singles, the German Oberhaus in Austria has the largest group among the continental elite classes. In addition to the German team, there are TTBL players from 16 other nations in Linz.
Naturally, the largest TTBL contingent will be playing for the German Table Tennis Association (DTTB): Five stars from TTBL clubs are in national coach Jörg Roßkopf's squad.
In the squad of European team champions Sweden, four aces earn their money in the top German league. Romania will line up with three Germany legionnaires and Belgium with two.
The German club with the most European Championship participants is Champions League winners 1. FC Saarbrücken: Linz's starting line-up includes six professionals with contracts with the runners-up.
Champions and cup winners Borussia Düsseldorf and former title holders TTC Zugbrücke Grenzau will each be sending three players. The remaining 15 TTBL professionals at the European Championships are spread across all nine other clubs in the German top flight. - The TTBL pros at the European Individual Championships in Linz at a glance:
TTC Schwalbe Bergneustadt: Benedikt Duda (Germany), Adrien Rassenfosse (Belgium)
Werder Bremen: Mattias Falck (Sweden), Andrei Putuntica (Moldova)
Borussia Dortmund: Anders Lind (Denmark), Cedric Nuytinck (Belgium)
Borussia Düsseldorf: Borgar Haug (Norway), Anton Källberg (Sweden), Dang Qiu (Germany/TV)
TTC RhönSprudel Fulda-Maberzell: Fanbo Meng, Dimitrij Ovtcharov (both Germany)
TTC Zugbrücke Grenzau: Maciej Kubik (Poland), Luka Mladenovic (Luxembourg), Samuel Walker (England)
ASC Grünwettersbach: Tiago Apolonia (Portugal)
TTC OE Bad Homburg: Andras Csaba (Hungary), Kristian Karlsson (Sweden)
TSV Bad Königshofen: Filip Zeljko (Croatia)
Post SV Mühlhausen: Daniel Habesohn (Austria), Ovidiu Ionescu (Romania)
TTF Liebherr Ochsenhausen: Simon Gauzy (France)
1. FC Saarbrücken: Patrick Franziska (Germany), Eduard Ionescu, Andrei Istrate (both Romania), Darko Jorgic (Slovenia), Truls Möregardh (Sweden), Abdullah Yigenler (Turkey)
Source: SID