The Olympic third Dimitrij Ovtcharov has to cancel his start at the World Table Tennis Championships in Houston / Texas (23-29 November) due to an ankle injury. The 33-year-old suffered the injury during training, Ovtcharov had already been operated on in Munich. “Of course it makes me very sad that I can’t go to the World Cup because I wanted to take the momentum from the Olympic Games into the World Championships,” he said. In Tokyo Ovtcharov had won bronze in the singles after losing in the semifinals very narrowly in the decisive seventh set against China’s series winner Ma Long. Together with Timo Boll and Patrick Franziska, he also secured silver in the team competition. National coach Jörg Roßkopf regrets Ovtcharov’s failure: “That is of course bitter for him. He was in a really good mood, played well and of course had big plans for the World Cup.” A decision will be made at the beginning of November who will replace Ovtcharov in the USA. Record European champions Boll, Franziska, Benedikt Duda and Dang Qiu have been nominated so far.
Ovtcharov missed World Cup sport
