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French Medallists Playing at Home
The Pro Tour French Open in Toulouse this week is an excellent opportunity for the French Olympic bronze medallists Jean-Philippe Gatien and Patrick Chila to perform for a home crowd. And they will be challenged by some of the best players in the World, though the Chinese have chosen to stay at home and practice with the new 40 mm ball.
Chiang Peng-Lung (TPE), Zoran Primorac (CRO), Jean-Michel Saive (BEL), Ma Wenge (CHN), Kalinikos Kreanga (GRE) and Koji Matsushita (JPN) are all going to Toulouse as members of the Top Twenty Club in the World.
The two other French names, Damien Eloi and Christophe Legout, who both made a good performance at the Olympics will attend also.
In the women's event the top seeded player is the Olympic bronze winner Chen Jing (TPE) and she will be challenged by all the best Europeans.
Two weeks ago the new and bigger 40 mm ball was introduced at the Men's World Cup. And though it was obvious that the top players of the World still needed some time to adjust to the fact that the new ball moves slower and with less spin, it seemed to be a success with longer and more spectacular rallies.
At the French Open a new experimental step into the future will be taken. The matches at the French Open will be played best of 7 games and only to 11 points - instead of the normal best out of 5 games and to 21 points. The experiment will show if playing only to 11 will make the game more exciting, because there will be more crucial points to play for. If so, the ITTF body might decide a change of the counting rule at its Annual General meeting in April 2001.
French Open has begun on Wednesday 1 November and will fall on Sunday 5 November.
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