European Championships 2016

M51 · Oct 23, 2016

Congrats to Joao and Daniela! It was such a joy seeing them win the mixed doubles. Epic final too!

Aleksandar · Oct 23, 2016

NextLevel said:
OK. If we believed such things without seeing the actual paddle, we would think Dima was using Bluefire.

Also I have information from tt forums that Lebesson played before with Tibhar Sinus Alpha both on fh and bh (year 2011)

Ilia Minkin · Oct 24, 2016

Aleksandar said:
Also I have information from tt forums that Lebesson played before with Tibhar Sinus Alpha both on fh and bh (year 2011)

That is interesting... Counterlooping a strong topspin should be really difficult with soft rubbers... Or I misunderstand something.

countrybread · Oct 24, 2016

I thought Lebesson's game looked quite ugly. Compared to Ma Long (the gold standard of mechanics) or even his compatriot, Tristan Flore, he seems lacking in proper form. And yet it worked. His quick attacks seemed to give his opponents a lot of trouble. Very comfortable with the plastic ball. No doubt they were motivated to rebound from their team losses in the World Championships and Olympics. They have some measure of redemption. Congratulations to Lebesson and Gauzy.

NextLevel · Oct 24, 2016

countrybread said:
I thought Lebesson's game looked quite ugly. Compared to Ma Long (the gold standard of mechanics) or even his compatriot, Tristan Flore, he seems lacking in proper form. And yet it worked. His quick attacks seemed to give his opponents a lot of trouble. Very comfortable with the plastic ball. No doubt they were motivated to rebound from their team losses in the World Championships and Olympics. They have some measure of redemption. Congratulations to Lebesson and Gauzy.

Lebesson was French champ in 2009 and has been a permanent fixture amongst the top French players for almost a decade. He is not a new quantity and this is the way he has always played. The French in general with a few exceptions are charactericed by non standard technique and creativity. You can check out Legout and Gatien if you doubt this, and Chila will always exemplify unorthodox all round play.

I know what you mean but I think people should stop acting like Lebesson just showed up out of nowhere. Look at his match last year at the WTTC vs Ma Long - that was probably the toughest match Ma Long played against someone not from China.

NextLevel · Oct 24, 2016

Ilia Minkin said:
That is interesting... Counterlooping a strong topspin should be really difficult with soft rubbers... Or I misunderstand something.

It's really supposed to be about how precise the rubber is when you swing hard. I wouldn't be surprised if Lebesson's stroke is taking advantage of something else because I have been fascinated by it for a while. He seems to spend a longer time making contact with the ball than many typical strokes.

Ilia Minkin · Oct 24, 2016

NextLevel said:
It's really supposed to be about how precise the rubber is when you swing hard. I wouldn't be surprised if Lebesson's stroke is taking advantage of something else because I have been fascinated by it for a while. He seems to spend a longer time making contact with the ball than many typical strokes.

Well, he has to have a very special contact with the ball to make those kind of powerloops he does. I remember when I played with Vega Pro for a while (which has a pretty hard sponge) counterlooping was almost effortless -- just choose the right angle and swing forward as much as you like to. Then I opted for a softish rubber, EL-P which helped my game overall, but counterlooping just sucked. The ball unpredictably went into the net over and over whenever I faced a slightly stronger shot. I don't usually counterloop in matches, but at least I wanted to practice it, so I switched to EL-S which seems to be better in this respect (and it is harder). And FX-P is even softer than EL-P...

NextLevel · Oct 24, 2016

Ilia Minkin said:
Well, he has to have a very special contact with the ball to make those kind of powerloops he does. I remember when I played with Vega Pro for a while (which has a pretty hard sponge) counterlooping was almost effortless -- just choose the right angle and swing forward as much as you like to. Then I opted for a softish rubber, EL-P which helped my game overall, but counterlooping just sucked. The ball unpredictably went into the net over and over whenever I faced a slightly stronger shot. I don't usually counterloop in matches, but at least I wanted to practice it, so I switched to EL-S which seems to be better in this respect (and it is harder). And FX-P is even softer than EL-P...

I hear you. His stroke is very shallow and sometimes he looks as if he is hitting the ball more than topspinning it. But in any case it will be interesting to see his blade close up. These websites do tell us that Dima is using Bluefire...

jedimasterplk · Oct 24, 2016

Lebehsson

Aleksandar said:
Also I have information from tt forums that Lebesson played before with Tibhar Sinus Alpha both on fh and bh (year 2011)

He plays with Tibhar Nimbus.

NextLevel · Oct 24, 2016

jedimasterplk said:
He plays with Tibhar Nimbus.

How do you know?

countrybread · Oct 24, 2016

NextLevel said:
Lebesson was French champ in 2009 and has been a permanent fixture amongst the top French players for almost a decade. He is not a new quantity and this is the way he has always played. The French in general with a few exceptions are charactericed by non standard technique and creativity. You can check out Legout and Gatien if you doubt this, and Chila will always exemplify unorthodox all round play.

I know what you mean but I think people should stop acting like Lebesson just showed up out of nowhere. Look at his match last year at the WTTC vs Ma Long - that was probably the toughest match Ma Long played against someone not from China.

Of course Lebesson has been around, but he's never won the European Championship before. In fact, he's the first Frenchman to do so since 1976. I'm just really happy for him because no one expected him to win. He's not even on the survey list on the top of this post as to who we think will win.

violoniste18 · Oct 24, 2016

I saw emmanuel Lebesson 6 month ago in my town. I went for our tournament.

My young son did a selfi with him.

Speed of his arm is insane, I was standing close to him, about 2 meters and I didn't see his arm.

When he hits the high balls, I never saw it, even with chinese players.

Beside table he's so kind, I discussed with him

In front he becomes a killer, you have to get an armor on protecting yourself.

NextLevel · Oct 24, 2016

countrybread said:
Of course Lebesson has been around, but he's never won the European Championship before. In fact, he's the first Frenchman to do so since 1976. I'm just really happy for him because no one expected him to win. He's not even on the survey list on the top of this post as to who we think will win.

But I disagree with you about Ma Long's toughest match from a non-Chinese player. Didn't Lebesson lose 1-3? Tristan Flore extended Ma Long to 3-4 in the Korean Open 2016. Lee Sang Su actually defeated Ma Long 4-1 in the 2012 Korean Open. Now that was a tough match.

At the WTTC in 2015. None of those matches took place at the WTTC in 2015.

Would I have picked Lebesson to win a major title? No. But watching him play in the French league and for France, is there a player he can't give a good match? He is tough if you are not used to him. That's my point.

His technique has always been French ugly as Boll's has been German ugly. I am just not sure why people make it sound like something new.

countrybread · Oct 24, 2016

NextLevel said:
At the WTTC in 2015. None of those matches took place at the WTTC in 2015.

Would I have picked Lebesson to win a major title? No. But watching him play in the French league and for France, is there a player he can't give a good match? He is tough if you are not used to him. That's my point.

His technique has always been French ugly as Boll's has been German ugly. I am just not sure why people make it sound like something new.

He's new if you haven't seen him play a lot before. Hahaha. And it did occur to me that your context was wttc 2015. So I tried to edit my text but you were too quick for me. My apologies.

NextLevel · Oct 24, 2016

countrybread said:
He's new if you haven't seen him play a lot before. Hahaha. And it did occur to me that your context was wttc 2015. So I tried to edit my text but you were too quick for me. My apologies.

Not at all. Maybe if Lebesson had won this match, then we wouldn't be discussing this

.

AndySmith · Oct 24, 2016

IMO, Leb has always had a higher-risk, low-percentage game in comparison with the majority of other male pros. I lose track of the number of times he's up 6-1 in games after a clutch of amazing close-in shots but then strings 5 errors in a row playing the same way. A tournament win for him requires everything to go his way, or a period of outstanding form - he can't just shamble through a few rounds. Personally, I don't like his style of play, or his shouting, but this was obviously a big achievement for him.

I do wonder if the selection of ball played into his hands in some way. They were using the Nittaku Premium, right? Perhaps it suits his style more.

TTFrenzy · Oct 24, 2016

AndySmith said:
IMO, Leb has always had a higher-risk, low-percentage game in comparison with the majority of other male pros. I lose track of the number of times he's up 6-1 in games after a clutch of amazing close-in shots but then strings 5 errors in a row playing the same way. A tournament win for him requires everything to go his way, or a period of outstanding form - he can't just shamble through a few rounds. Personally, I don't like his style of play, or his shouting, but this was obviously a big achievement for him.

I do wonder if the selection of ball played into his hands in some way. They were using the Nittaku Premium, right? Perhaps it suits his style more.

Well said there! Lebe was literally counterhitting/loopkilling almost everything and many times off the bounce. I've never seen him play like this, he relies very much on 3rd ball attack fooling the opponent on short game but when the rally opens up FH all over the table cannot give you consistent results without a steady BH. Let's not forget that Gauzy made some crucial unforced errors in the 3rd set, being 7-4 up and then losing all the points.

Anyway, would like to see more of jakub dyjas from now on. I didnt know he was so young, thought he was 25-27 or something

Xylit · Oct 24, 2016

NextLevel said:
I know what you mean but I think people should stop acting like Lebesson just showed up out of nowhere.

Well, but that is exactly what has happened. And that was also possible since the top players had their peak at the Olympic Games this year. Otherwise he might still be "nowhere", of course at a very high level but far away from being at Euoropean Champion level.

NextLevel · Oct 24, 2016

Xylit said:
Well, but that is exactly what has happened. And that was also possible since the top players had their peak at the Olympic Games this year. Otherwise he might still be "nowhere", of course at a very high level but far away from being at Euoropean Champion level.

The only thing that Lebesson did here that was surprising was play his high risk table tennis more consistently over the period of the Euros. He has probably beaten every player he had played before at the Euros at some point or another. Sure, consider that showing up out of nowhere, but if Lebesson was to play Fan Zhendong, I would bet on Fan Zhendong, but I would never bet my life that Lebesson had no chance of winning. I don't care how good the player is because I have seen interesting things. Lebesson also played the Olympics by the way.

NextLevel · Oct 24, 2016

European Championships 2016

Who do you think will win the European Championships 2016?

Dimitrij Ovtcharov

Vladimir Samsonov

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Tiago Apolonia

Simon Gauzy

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Andrej Gacina

Alexander Shibaev

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