by Ian Marshall The no.23 seed, Haruna Ojio accounted for Romania’s Elena Zaharia (11-2, 11-1, 11-9, 11-8), later in the day, in a similar manner, Miyuu Kihara, the no.17 seed, overcame Camille Lutz of France, the no.3 seed (11-7, 11-2, 11-6, 11-2). Surprise results but not when the pedigree of the Japanese teenagers is considered. […]
by Simon Daish Dreaming big, Belik’s first objective was to make his way through the Under-17 Boys’ Singles quarter-finals. Taking on Carlos Fernandez of Peru, Belik rose to the occasion to beat the Latin American across four games (11-6, 8-11, 11-8, 11-9). One victory in the bag, Belik earnt his second of the day in […]
by Simon Daish Lebrun ranked 56th in the ITTF Table Tennis Youth Rankings, achieved his first goal of progressing from the group stage with little difficulty, and couldn’t have asked for a better start to the knock-out rounds as he outclassed Belarus’ Hleb Behunou 3-0 (11-8, 11-5, 11-4). However, Lebrun’s standout moment arrived in the […]
Chirita defies expectations to land U-17 title in Vila Real 13 May 2021
Packed with drama, the second day of play at WTT Youth Contender Vila Real saw the event’s first champions being crowned with Romania’s Iulian Chirita providing the headline act with his success in the Under-17 Boys’ Singles tournament.
Iulian Chirita lands U17 title in Vila Real
by Simon Daish
Earlier than anticipated departures for Puerto Rico’s Angel Naranjo and Belgium’s Louis Laffineur blew the title race wide open, ready for an ambitious outsider to capitalise. Step forward Iulian Chirita!
Negotiating his two remaining group fixtures against Portugal’s Francisco Ferreira and Spain’s Francesc Carrera in straight games, Chirita, ranked 22nd on the ITTF Table Tennis Youth Ranking list, then went on to see off Israel’s Uri Almor across four games (9-11, 12-10, 11-4, 11-5), before defeating Czech Republic’s Simon Belik by the same margin in the semi-finals (11-6, 6-11, 11-9, 1