The ITTF GJP Blog

.. You still need to be able to steer the ship to shore.

Plenty of tired cadet age athletes in the Good Hope Center today . This particular event is a true test of mental character and physical conditioning.

Some of the youngsters came up flat today . The promising Paraguayan Marcello Aguirre was one of them, playing the complete day as he would have something to loose. Marcelo was in deep trouble with Khaled Assar from Egypt in the round of sixteen but managed to squeeze out a win. Apparently this was not enough to generate self confidence and belief,  instead his performance in the quarterfinal followed the same footprints ,  as he fell in five games against the much more aggressive Tomas Le Breton from France.

The Latin American team in general have  come up short in this event. They are less prepared and lack confidence and drive in important moments.

On the PLUS side of things we witnessed another solid day of high level performance from the Korean girl  Yang Ha Eun.  She is solid as a rock and has been unbelievable consistent from day one in the training camp. Yang , a right handed shake-hand player is born in 1994 leaving her with another two years to go in Cadet events all over the world…

Three good junior matches in front of our eyes today;

Andy Pereira the crowd-favourite here in Cape Town failed to convert on a 7-2 advantage in the sixth game vs the Japanese defender Muchi,  who played well , but in this case got the victory handed to him by a suddenly quiet and passive Cuban boy.

Paul Drinkhall lost two matches in his group and was clearly defeated by the left-handed Korean SEO Hyun Deok ,  a positive surprise with his clean and explosive techniques.

Elizabeta Samara squeezed out the narrowest of victories against the Japanese Wakamiya in the best junior girls match so far.