Sharath's brilliant win over World no. 18 Christian Suss

Sharath of TSV Grafelfing won over the highly rated Christian Suss of Borussia Dusseldorf in the German league. Here is a video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YThCe6OS7-8

Happy New Year to all our readers

Wish you all success in everything you do, especially in your Table Tennis.
- From the www.tabletennisbug.com team

Ping Pong film - An award winner

Excerpts:
Peco (real name Yutaka Hoshino) and Smile (real name Makoto Tsukimoto) are members of Katase High table tennis club. Peco is charismatic and has a passion for the sport, while Smile is introverted.
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The film then jumps forward several years: Peco has fulfilled his dream of playing professionally in Europe.

Read more about this fascinating film at Wikipedia at the following location:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ping_Pong_%28film%29

Director: Fumihiko Sori

Timo Boll runner-up in German Athlete of the Year Poll

Timo Boll came second in the race for Germany's athlete of the year. Sebastian Vettel topped the poll in which 1,300 journalists participated. The event was held at the ZDF Gala evening in Kuhaus, Baden Baden. Golfer Martin Kaymer finished third.

Timo Boll's achievements:

• Led Germany to the Silver medal at the Liebherr World Team Championships at Moscow
• Third at Liebherr Men's World Cup
• Three titles at European Championships (Men's singles, Men's Doubles and Team)
• Men's Singles winner at German Open, Europe Top 12, Volkswagen Cup
• Main player at Borussia Dusseldorf in Bundesliga. Won German Cup and European Champions League

USATT Coach of the year

The following coaches have been nominated for the Coach of the year to the U.S. Olympic Committee's Coach of the Year selection process.

National Team COY - Lily Yip (Current Women's Jr. National Team Coach) - Warren, NJ
Development COY - Sean O'Neill - Portland, OR
Paralympic COY - Daniel Rutenberg - Frisco, TX

USATT new Membership Rates Effective April 1, 2011

The following are the new USATT Membership Rates effective April 2011:

Adult one-year membership $ 49
Adult three-year membership $130
Collegiate one-year membership $ 25
Junior one-year membership $ 25
Junior three-year membership $ 60
Household one-year membership $ 90
Household three-year membership $250
Millennium Life membership $1,000
Foreign one-year membership $ 75

China to train foreign Table Tennis players

Liu Guoliang and Shi Zhihao will head the coaching team that will train foreign players at the Shanghai Table Tennis Academy. China has been criticized for dominating Table Tennis at the World level.

The training will include Table Tennis theory and practice based on the Chinese methods.

Players who train at the academy will have to work hard. It may entail spending 7 hours of hard sweat and toil for around 6 days a week. The sessions are expected to start from next September and the academy has the strong backing of the Shanghai government.

Flash news: Sathiyan wins at Vadodara

G Sathiyan created a major upset by beating Soumyadeep Roy to win the Central Zone national ranking tournament at Vadodara 4-2.

Details awaited.

Professional Indian Table Tennis Players

It is interesting to note that there is a growing trend of Table Tennis players from India competing in League matches in foreign countries. For example, Sharath Kamal plays in the elite German Bundesliga. Zubin Kumar and Pathik Mehta play in the Spanish leagues. Soumyajit Ghosh, G Sathiyan, and Harmeet Desai are spending extended periods of time training in Sweden. Some other players spent time training in China. Many other players have played different leagues at various times.

Right now, most of these players do not earn lucrative sums of money, but there is some hope from this year. The ITTF has announced aggressive plans for the Pro Tour with handsome prize money. If the game gets more popular, there is a chance that the leagues will play more money to the participants. This is indeed a good trend.

Do you know of any other professional players?

Flash news - Arnab Adhikari wins Junior Boy's crown at Baroda

Arnab Adhikari claimed another top victim to emerge champion in the Junior Boy's event at the Central Zone Table Tennis championship at Baroda.

Arnab won 4-1 against Sudhanshu Grover. Earlier, Arnab had scripted a major upset over Abhishek Yadav.