2025 European Team Table Tennis Championships (October 12 to 19, 2025)

[NextLevel]

Fact is the FFTT opens the tickets sale to ALL the french clubs first when a competition is organized on the french soil, you can add to it the chinese diaspora in France that is massive for international level competitions, and you get that atmosphere with a lot of young kids. There are some discounts for the FFTT's clubs members.

So there is a substantial player base and the tickets are sometimes subsidized. I know there is a marketing side to this but this is not an easy sport to watch if you are not on some level a player. If we can address that problem better then the sport has a chance to grow.

 

[PoppaChubby]

I drove three hours to watch the semis yesterday. Saw hundreds of familiar faces at the venue. But that's just the thing, practically everyone in those stands (including myself and the gang from my club) was either a player, a coach or a club official who got in for free. I don't think a single local bought an actual ticket for this event. Croatian people (the civilians, I mean) just don't care about table tennis any more, and I think both the media and the HSTS-CTTU are to blame.

WTT Contender in Zagreb was no better in that regard.

It's been like that in France too before the Bros arrived. Europe is mainly about football, basket ball, handball, ex-Yougoslavia countries are like that too. Maybe France's sport culture is different ? I don't really know about the others so can't make assumptions. France for sure has a strong event organization culture and history: Tour De France, french classics like Paris-Roubaix, all the football competitions, now the olympics in Paris that have been an undeniable success, the WTT in Montpellier with 40 000 tickets sold last year.
EDIT: I forgot Rolland Garros, one the tennis Grand Slams, each year, with the same system, discounts for kids that are FFT's clubs members, that's why the wednesdays are packed with kids screaming all the time hahaha

The ITTF and WTT are handcuffed by Qatar and China, so no surprise that the competitions were held in countries that have no expertise in TT event organizations like South Africa or Qatar where the broadcasting has been a real shame.

 

[PoppaChubby]

So there is a substantial player base and the tickets are sometimes subsidized. I know there is a marketing side to this but this is not an easy sport to watch if you are not on some level a player. If we can address that problem better then the sport has a chance to grow.

The problem with US Grand Smash has been here indeed: if it's not basketball or american football or baseball, game over. What I don't understand is that there is a strong chinese and korean diaspora there, a lot of people from japanese descent too, so maybe USATT should encourage those people way more.

But the main problem has been the lack of TT event's organization culture: the US officials have treated TT like sh*t, with most of the competition under a tent (?) with AC at full power (??) and a ... wooden floor under the Enlio one (???), this is way too much ignorance at that point.

 

[PoppaChubby]

Now that being said I'm glad the WTTTC will be held in London next year, the UK is an events organization expert too, and this is where TT was born, so you can be sure the UK will make something like "TT is back at home" to encourage people to go there.

It will be fully packed by french, belgians, dutch, germans, swedes and of course chinese people, the trains, specially the Eurostar, the channel tunnel for cars and buses and ferries will help a lot getting there for all those countries.

 

[PoppaChubby]

I'm old enough to remember better days. It wasn't always like this.

I remember the days before the civil war with Lupulesku and Primo playing the doubles, this pair was unbelievable to watch, so much TT science...

I think it was in 1989, champion's league match between Levallois UTT and Belgrade Red Star (edit: sorry, I guess naming it Beograd was a bit too much for a croatian citizen), Gatien was playing the double with Lo Chuen Tsung as far as I can remember, easy win for Ilija and Zoki.

 

[M51]

These umpires are utterly unqualified.

 

[PoppaChubby]

Ilija Lupulesku has never performed that well in single events but man... the highest IQ for doubles by far ! the best feeling ! what a left hand he had...

 

[PoppaChubby]

Sh*t everuthings come back now, I also remember the Saive-Rosskopf final with Jorg's victory in the ETTC '92 in Germany. The venue was packed, it was the golden era for Europe, vibrant crowd too full of french, swedes, germans and belgians !

 

[NextLevel]

I asked a guy who should know about the decision to play Ranefur over Falck. He said it was uncontroversial and at worst a 50-50 because Falck has a reputation for not delivering in Teams matches. Just some extra color on a decision that might have seemed weird to even a not-so-casual fan like myself. He said that peak aside, Karlsson has actually been the more consistent player across league, tournaments etc. Obviously, Falck has the big silver...

 

[PoppaChubby]

So there is a substantial player base and the tickets are sometimes subsidized. I know there is a marketing side to this but this is not an easy sport to watch if you are not on some level a player. If we can address that problem better then the sport has a chance to grow.

That's the point: all the Day Pass are sold out for WTT Montpellier, it's french All Saints Holidays since saturday until November 3rd, so it will be packed by the kids members of FFTT clubs as there's again discounts for them.

 

[Metaxa]

Sh*t everuthings come back now, I also remember the Saive-Rosskopf final with Jorg's victory in the ETTC '92 in Germany. The venue was packed, it was the golden era for Europe, vibrant crowd too full of french, swedes, germans and belgians !

At that time, every country you mention had its own ‘chouchou’, but now this is actually much less prevalent.

Sweden has Truls, France has the brothers & Simon, Germany has Sabine & Annett, Romania has Bernadette, but that's about it. There is still a lot of emerging talent, but they still have to prove themselves at the highest level and they need to have a certain showmanship, otherwise they will not be cheered on by the general public.

 

[Tony's Table Tennis]

Fact is the FFTT opens the tickets sale to ALL the french clubs first when a competition is organized on the french soil, you can add to it the chinese diaspora in France that is massive for international level competitions, and you get that atmosphere with a lot of young kids. There are some discounts for the FFTT's clubs members.

The strong club culture in France and Germany is also why the sport is doing well. It is an entire ecosystem

 

[NextLevel]

Gatien crossed my mind and then I started thinking- how many countries have former or current world champions and in how many of those countries is table tennis still thriving?