World Table Tennis For Health Festival: The competitive presence of the Greek athletes

The athletes enjoy every moment of their time at the competitive tables, they generally enjoy the experience on the wonderful island of Crete and the World Table Tennis For Health Festival continues in an ideal atmosphere and with the spirit that perfectly suits the occasion. In the Two Aoraki of Heraklion, the World championships for people with Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s bring out the recreational and social character of table tennis and at the same time remind the benefits of the sport in dealing with serious neurological diseases. About 60 men and women, the vast majority of them for the established World Parkinson Championship, are participating in the big event, which E.F.O.E.P.A. has the pleasure and honor to organize. under the auspices and authorization of the ITTF Foundation. The Festival ends tomorrow, Sunday 05/11, while tonight the World Health Congress ends at Arina Beach Resort, which is part of the event and scientifically analyzes how important playing table tennis is for sufferers. The results of the matches are of the least importance, of course, but we will briefly mention the presence of the Greeks so far.

In two matches of the Parkinson’s championship, in singles and doubles, the blue and white colors reached the quarter-finals. In Men’s Singles Class 1, Paraskevas Deskoulidis was placed in the 5-8th positions and in Men’s Doubles Classes MD2-3, the same athlete and Manolis Markakis were eliminated today in the quarter-final round. Also in the Parkinson’s double mixed and Mixed Doubles Classes XD2-3 Isidora Vassiliou and her partner Hillel Semer from Israel claim the 3rd place in a single group. A valuable and special experience for all Greeks, who take part in such a championship for the first time and of course get to know each other and exchange opinions with people from foreign countries. In the championship for Alzheimer’s, the Greeks are the protagonists anyway, as there is only one participation from abroad.

The coaching team is headed by Polychronis Politsis, who took over as manager of the Parkinson team under a contract with E.F.O.E.P.A.. Stefanos Spanakis, Michalis Manias help voluntarily, mainly for the athletes from Crete, as and Christina Athanasopoulou, who is Politsis’ assistant. Since Friday, the Swedish president of the ITTF Petra Sorling, who has been a member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) for a few days, is in Heraklion and honoring the event. She has daily cooperation with the organizing committee, the heads of the administration of the Greek federation and the Argentinian director of the Leandro Olvech Foundation and shows her absolute satisfaction with the progress of the WTT4HF.

Among the officials, who give the “present” from table tennis, are also our legendary champion Kallinikos Kreanga and the former president of EFOEPA and current secretary general of the Hellenic Olympic Committee Manolis Kolymbadis.

The course of the Greeks is summarized as follows:

In Men’s Singles Class 1 there were 4 qualifying groups. Manolis Markakis competed in the 2nd group and was ranked 3rd with a 3-0 victory. He also had an Asian opponent, the Chinese Liu Shengping.

In the 3rd group, Paraskevas Deskoulidis participated and qualified for the knockouts with 2nd place. He prevailed 3-0 against the Frenchman Benard Jean Glod and defeated the Frenchman In Guerrard without a fight with the same score. In the quarter-finals, he was eliminated in 3-0 sets by the French Remy Salaun.

In Men’s Singles Class 2 there were 2 qualifying groups. Nikos Koukoulakis competed in 1st and finished in 5th place without a win.

In Men’s Singles Class 3, 3 groups of 5 athletes were formed and each had a Greek athlete. In the 1st, Apostolos Apostolakos suffered 4 defeats and finished 5th.

In the 2nd, Evangelos Gorgas was also in 5th place with 5 losses. In the 3rd set, Nikos Ousme took 4th place. He had a positive result against Rajes Naji from South Africa with 3-1 sets and from then on he recorded 4 defeats.

In Women’s Singles Class 1, Isidora Vassiliou competed in the 1st group and came 3rd with 2 defeats from European athletes.

In the 2nd group were Lydia De Latour and Theodora Nikolaou. They were eliminated with 3rd and 4th place respectively. De Latour prevailed in the match between them with 3-2 sets.

In Women’s Singles Class 2 there were 2 groups and Vasiliki Kastani took part in the 1st of the 5 athletes. Facing only European gymnasts, she finished last, however she lost two of the games.

Those who were eliminated in the groups went to “consolation” games, except for Kastanis who could not continue.

In Men’s Doubles Classes MD2-3 there were initially 3 groups of equal pairs. In the 2nd group, Manolis Markakis/Paraskevas Deskoulidis qualified as 2nd with their victory against the French Zn Louis Dufloux and Benard Jean Claude with 3-0 sets. In the knockouts they lost 3-0 sets to Zuri Eldi/Hillel Semer from Israel.

In the categories Men’s Doubles Classes MD4 and Men’s Doubles Classes MD5-6, where it was formed by a single group, no Greek couple participated. Just as there was no Greek participation in the only women’s doubles category, the Women’s Doubles Classes MD2-3-4.

In mixed doubles, two categories were created. In Mixed Doubles Classes XD2-3, Isidora Vassiliou teamed up with the Israeli Hillel Shemer. In a group of 5 pairs, Kemal Kara/Andrea Hafner from Austria won 3-0 sets. They had 2 defeats against European duos and currently have 4 points. Tomorrow Sunday, in the last race, they will fight for the bronze medal against their opponents Brian Carson/Joey Paul from Scotland.

Greece did not have a representative in the 2 groups of Mixed Doubles Class XD4-5.

In the men’s championship for people with Alzheimer’s there was a single group with 4 Greek athletes and one Bulgarian. The games end tomorrow, Sunday, however, with 3 wins so far, Giorgos Charitakis has secured the gold medal. He defeated Yiannis Michalodimitrakis with 3-2 sets, Vassilis Papadopoulos also with 3-2 and Zacharias Tsagarakis with 3-0 sets. Michalodimitrakis is 2nd with wins against Veselin Nedeltsev with 3-0 and Papadopoulos with 3-1 sets. In the final, Haritakis faces the Bulgarian athlete, but even if he loses and Michalodimitrakis “catches” him to 7 points, the tie favors him. In yet another Greek match, Papadopoulos defeated Tsagarakis with 3-0 sets.

In the women’s championship for people with Alzheimer’s there was also a group with 4 Greek women. The 1st place was won by the undefeated Katerina Kallergi. She defeated Zafirenia Daskalaki and Cleo Rigaki with 3-1 sets and Zafira Tzakou with 3-2. 2nd place was won by Tzakou, winning 3-0 against Rigaki and Daskalaki. The 3rd place was taken by Rigaki when she defeated Daskalaki with 3-0 sets.