by Simon Daish

Questionable Form, but Confident of Success

Dimitrij Ovtcharov claimed his first European Championship Men’s Singles title at 2013’s rendition of the event, and two years later he beat Marcos Freitas (POR) in the final of the 2015 tournament.

The German player has been seeded first once again for this year’s Championships making him a key favourite to take the trophy.

However, having made early exits at the 2016 Olympic Games and the Liebherr 2016 Men’s World Cup, Ovtcharov doesn’t enter the Championships in the strongest of forms.

Losing his opening round match at the Men’s World Cup to Kristian Karlsson (SWE) was a major setback for Ovtcharov but the German contestant insists that he enters the European Championships in a good frame of mind, “After my poor performance in Saarbrücken I have trained well this week and I’ll go positively into the tournament.”

“I have won many titles at European level in recent years, and have a certain extra dose of self-confidence” – Dimitrij Ovtcharov (Germany).

King of European Competitions

Ovtcharov certainly is no slouch when it comes to competing at European competitions in the Men’s Singles category with two European Championship titles and a European Games gold medal to his name, and the world number six (October 2016) believes that he can afford to relax a little at the upcoming Championships in Budapest:

“I’m already a European champion” added Ovtcharov. “I can go into this tournament more relaxed and react cooler than in previous situations.”

The most recent major Europe exclusive competition was in February of this year where Dimitrij Ovtcharov took home the 2016 ITTF Europe Top 16 cup, will Ovtcharov replicate that result at the 2016 European Championships?