They were announced on Tuesday by the ITTF, as is the case every week, and for Panagiotis Gionis they were about maintaining his place in the top 100 in the world. It may be that in the WTT Singapore Smash, which is still ongoing, he was eliminated in the first qualifying round and did not get anything in the points, but he stayed at number 97 and did not lose anything in the pre-Olympic process and the “hunt” for the qualification to Paris 2024.
From then on, the good placings of Greek athletes in the WTT Youth Contender had a positive impact on the world rankings of young age groups. Stathis Manolopoulos, who competed only in the U19 category and entered the “16”, collected 180 points in Panagiouriste.
Giannis Anastasiadis and Giannis Koutras, who were in the “32” in two categories (U17 and U19), each won 185 points and Alexandros Madesis 125 with the same placing in the U19.
Giorgos Kosmas, who in the U19 was in the first round, got close to 100 points, 55 by Kostas Fakaros, who had a better score in the 16th in the U15, 30 by Alkistis Kasimi who qualified for the U17 board and in general for all the aforementioned boards they reserved a significant rise. The entry of new children into the boards after the crowded “excursion” in Bulgaria is also noted.
In the men’s ranking, Gionis was in 97th place with 209 points. He competed in the WTT Singapore Smash for the second year in a row, this time he was eliminated at the beginning of the qualifiers by Austrian Daniel Habesson, however, he is not losing ground.
Within the qualification criteria for the Olympic Games, he is still chasing the ranking increase and in the last months he had moved up several places. Constantinos Angelakis (No. 304) and Yiannis Sgouropoulos (No. 350) follow with a slight retreat.
The series remains the same in the women’s ranking, with a drop of three and four places for the Greek internationals. Katerina Toliou went to number 233, Elisavet Terpou to 344, Malamatenia Papadimitriou to 391 and Dimitra-Thomais Tsekoura to 404.
In the ranking lists of the young ages there were also points…jumps for the Greek colors after Panagiouriste. In the category of athletes up to 19 years old, Manolopoulos climbed 135 places. He moved up to world number 260 and, taking 180 points in Bulgaria, has a total of 370.
In the same category, Madesis went 176 places higher. With a total of 250 points they are at number 341. Anastasiadis and Koutras are together at number 398 with 194 points. Thessaloniki climbed 999 places and Koutras 1,009! Kosmas was 236 places higher. He scored 94 points in the Open and, with a total of 164, is at number 449.
Further down, Giorgos Gerakios appears at number 1,341 with a rise of 308 places and Grigoris Tsilopoulos at 1,246 with his first 13 points.
In the K17 category, Anastasiadis and Koutra are also together at number 241. Last week they were at 1,059 and 1,068 respectively. Kosmas follows at No 280 from last week’s 459. Fakaros appears at number 472 out of 946 and Tsilopoulos at his entry at No 950.
In the children’s category, Fakaros went 327 places higher. They are at number 199 with 67 points overall. Dimitris-Marios Alexandridis rose to number 593 (taking 5 points from the tournament), while Giorgos Sassanis and Michalis Bithavas are in their first appearance at positions 771 and 773 respectively (they took 6 points each).
In the K13 category, Alexandridis is at number 233, Sassanis at 333, Bithavas at 335 and 11-year-old Nikos Alexidis, who also debuted as a Youth Contender at 395. The latter got his first 5 international points in the tournament and in its own category, K11, it appears at number 87.
In the junior world tables, Alcistis Kasimi and Mavra Kontopoulou improved their positions, while Chrysavgi Tsilopoulou made her first appearance. In the K17 category, Kasimi, which entered the “32” of the board and took a total of 30 points from Panagiouriste, moved to number 471 from 817 of the previous week (39 points in total).
Kontopoulou is at number 573 (out of 680) with 23 points (she got 9 in Bulgaria) and Tsilopoulou, after her first international participation, at No. 823.
Finally, in the K19 category, Kasimi gained 405 places and went to number 663, Kontopoulou is at 780 (an increase of 117 places) and Tsilopoulou at 1,069.
After the games at “Arena Asarel”, Kasimi became the first Greek junior in the world ranking, while the same happened with Fakaros in the boys.
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