by Ian Marshall, ITTF Publications Manager

A right handed attacking player, who very much favours the crouched Dimitrij Ovtcharov backhand style of serving, now 22 years old, from the very start of his career, the progress of Elias Ranefur has been carefully nurtured by the venerable Nisse Sandberg at the Ångby club in the suburbs of Stockholm.

The result of the guidance was that in 2014, Elias Ranefur enjoyed his most successful year to day.

Notably, he competed in the ITTF World Junior Circuit Finals in the Paraguayan capital city of Asuncion; in addition he qualified for the Nanjing Youth Olympic Games by wining in the Road to Nanjing tournament in the Cook Islands, whilst most significantly he was the runner up in the Boys’ Singles event at the European Youth Championships staged in Riva del Garda, Italy.

In London Elias Ranefur lines up alongside Kristian Karlsson, Anton Källberg and Pär Gerell; the Swedes now being the no.8 seeds in the Men’s event as opposed to the no.6 seeds as when Mattias Karlsson was included; the top three names present in each team in London, according to the World Team Ranking for February, determine the seeded order.

France who select from Simon Gauzy, Emmanuel Lebesson, Quentin Robinot, Alexandre Robinot and Alexandre Cassin climb one place and now occupy the no.6 seed place; likewise it is one place higher for the Brazilian trio formed by Hugo Calderano, Gustavo Tsuboi and Eric Jouti, the are now the no.7 seeds.

The draw for the first stage of both the Men’s and Women’s events will take place at the Grange Tower Hotel at 3.00pm on Wednesday 21st February.