Sweden’s 19 year old Fabian Akerstrom was the one player to cause an upset in the morning session of play on Thursday 20th November 2008 at Erke German Open in Berlin.
In the qualification stage of the Men’s Singles event, he beat Japan’s Taku Takakiwa in six games to dent the hopes of the rising Asian stars progress.
Taku Takakiwa currently occupies the no.175 spot on the ITTF Men’s World Rankings, whilst Fabian Akerstrom is at no.277, his highest ever position. However, the gap of over 100 places was of little relevance as the Swede progressed to victory.
Akerstrom was beaten in his opening match in the group by Germany’s Ruwen Filus in straight games; a result that does not bode well for the young Swede.
The decision as to who will progress now rests on the final match in the group which sees Ruwen Filus confront Taku Takakiwa.
Caught the Eye
It was a fine effort by Fabian Akerstrom who caught the eye at the ITTF World Junior Championships in Linz in December 2005, when he beat Germany’s Dimitrij Ovtcharov in the quarter-finals before losing to Japan’s Jun Mizutani.
Both Dimitrij Ovtcharov and Jun Mizutani have progresses to great heights in the intervening period and are now established at senior level.
At the Erke German Open, Dimitrij Ovtcharov is seeded no. 2 whilst Jun Mizutani is seeded no. 8.
Past Swedish Stars
Akerstrom hasn’t quite kept pace with his contemporaries of three years ago; whilst he is clearly capable of causing upsets one wonders whether his style of play hampers progress to top level.
He is very un-Swedish if such a word exists.
Think of great Swedish players of the past; immediately comes to mind the genius of Jan-Ove Waldner, the power of Jörgen Persson and Kjell Johansson, the speed of Erik Lindh, the consistency of Mikael Appelgren and the sheer determination of Peter Karlsson. Of course there are many others.
Different Style
Fabian Akerstrom undoubtedly has the determination of Peter Karlsson but his style does not resemble any of his Swedish table tennis ancestors.
Staying close to the table, he uses long pimples on the backhand and attacks with the forehand; in this day and age there must be question marks as to whether such a style can really be effective at high level.
Bygone Era
Players like Hong Kong’s Lo Chuen Tsung and England’s Carl Prean enjoyed success, principally in the 1980s, using different surfaces on the backhand but I doubt they would have been so successful the modern era.
However, if you wanted a player to compete in the very last match for your team when the scores were level then there were few better than Carl Prean.
Winning Counts
Mentally very strong, a quality Fabian Akerstrom, the Harry Potter look-a-like, showed in Berlin on the second day of play.
I have doubts about his style of play but he won and that’s what counts.
Source: www.ittf.com
