by Ian Marshall, Editor
The appointees are the Czech Republic’s Dana Cechova and Egypt’s El-Sayed Lsashin, both players well known in the international arena.
Integral to the success of the Czech Republic’s Women’s Team, Dana Cechova, now 35 years old, occupies the no.81 spot on the current Women’s World Rankings, notably the highest of her career; her best on the ITTF World Tour being five years ago when she reached the semi-final stage of the Women’s Singles event at the Egypt Open in Cairo.
Meanwhile, El-Sayed Lashin has been a stalwart of the Egyptian team throughout the current century, recently 38 years old he announced his retirement from international play. Runner up in the Men’s Singles event on the ITTF World Tour in Nigeria in 2014, El-Sayed Lashin has been one of the dominant players in Africa in the last two decades.
He won the Africa Cup in 1998 in Cairo, retained the title in 1999 in Nairobi, before succeeding again in 2002 in Johannesburg and in 2013 in Oyo; additionally he secured the Men’s Singles title at 2012 African Senior Championships in Cairo.
Thus the complete ITTF Athletes Commission, which takes into consideration a gender balance, is formed by:
Interim Chair: Ryu Seungmin (Korea Republic), member of the International Olympic Committee,
Elected Athletes: Galia Dvorak (Spain), Marcos Madrid (Mexico), Zoran Primorac (Croatia), Jean-Michel Saive (Belgium), Wang Liqin (China)
Elected Para Athletes: Alena Kanova (Slovakia), Trevor Hirth (Australia)
ITTF Executive Committee Appointed Athletes: Sarah Hanffou (Cameroon), Matthew Hetherington (New Zealand), Jasna Rather (United States)
ITTF Athletes Committee Appointed Athletes: Dana Cechova (Czech Republic), El-Sayed Lashin (Egypt)