The Burg Wachter Castello hall in Dusseldorf opened the doors for
best European players at 39th Liebherr Europe Top-12 in Dusseldorf. The
best paddlers from the Old Continent were present today at the draw
ceremony and press conference. The leading players in Men’s event
underlined that the competition is very hard in Dusseldorf.
Seed number one according to world rankings in February, Timo BOLL will
play in the group with Adrian CRISAN (ROU) and Zoran PRIMORAC (HRV). "It
is very strong group. It will be hard for me to play on the highest
level after very long and exhaustive season. Nevertheless here are the
three German representative and we have an extra motive for wining, "added
Timo BOLL who will play against PRIMORAC at the opening tomorrow at 11
am. Second seed is Vladimir SAMSONOV. Belarus is in group with CHEN
Weixing (AUT) and TAN Ruiwu (HRV).
"All groups are equally difficult. I am happy that I can play here,
because I lived in Dusseldorf for seven years. Timo is favorite, but
there is long way ahead of us," said SAMSONOV.
LIU Jia from Austria leading the ledies. Austrian girls is in group
with Daniela DODEAN (ROU) and Wenling TAN MONFARDINI (ITA). At the
question how hard will be to play in the group with the leading player
at the event young Romanian just comment: "It is OK!" LIU Jia added that she hopes to get into quarterfinal. "For me it is important to finish with good result in group. For the rest, we will see."
The press conference started with the congratulations to the newly
father Werner SCHLAGER who will not be able to defend his title and to
Jean Michel SAVE who will play at Top 12 for the 20th time.Before the
draw, president of DTTB Thomas WEIKERT and manager director of
Sportagentur Agency from Dusseldorf Christian KOKE, addressed to the
guests with words of welcome. "Welcome to the city of Dusseldorf,
the city of sport. I hope that our guest will have time to enjoy their
staying and that players will have excited matches", said Christian KOKE.
The Burg Wachter Castello hall is already well known to some players.
"Many of players had practice here before, and now we are happy
that we can organize the tournament. This is the perfect venue for
table tennis", said president of DTTB Thomas WEIKERT.
THE GROUPS - Women
Group A: LIU Jia (AUT), Daniela DODEAN (ROU), Wenling TAN MONFARDINI (ITA)
Group B : Krisztina TOTH (HUN), LI Jie (NED), Tamara BOROS (HRV)
Group C: LI Qian (POL), Viktoria PAVLOVICH (BLR), Elizabeta SAMARA (ROU)
Group D: LI Jiao (NED), WU Jiaduo (GER), NI XIA Lian (LUX)
THE GROUPS - Men
Group A: Timo BOLL (Germany), Adrian CRISAN (ROU), Zoran PRIMORAC (HRV)
Group B: Kalinikos KREANGA (GRE), Michael MAZE (DEN), Jean Michel SAIVE (BEL)
Group C: Dimitrij OVTCHAROV (GER), Jörgen PERSSON (SWE), Robert GARDOS (AUT)
Group D: Vladimir SAMSONOV (BLR), CHEN Weixing (AUT), TAN Ruiwu (HRV)
Source: www.ittf.com
