Sports Club

Romania’s women’s table tennis team has walked away with silver medals at the recently-held European Championships in Russia’s Ekaterinburg. In this past Tuesday’s finals, Romania sustained a 3-nil defeat in the game against Germany.

Florin Orban, 30.09.2015, 13:19

It was all too obvious Germany was way better than Romania. In the first game, Ying Han thrashed Bernadette Szocs, 3-nil. After having wasted a set ball in the first leg, conceding a narrow 12-10 defeat, the Romanian simply couldn’t take the heat for the rest of the game, and was trounced in the following two sets, 11-1.

However, a more balanced game was the one pitting Xiaona Han against Elisabeta Samara. In the first two sets, Samara conceded defeat to her German opponent, 12-10, also losing the third set, 11-5. The only Romanian tennis player to have been a whisk away from winning a game was Daniela Dodean, who took on Petrissa Solja. Dodean lost the first two sets, yet she braced up and won the other two, only to concede defeat in the crucial set, 11-9.

The bronze medals went to Russia and Ukraine.

In Ekaterinburg, Romania’s lineup, whose manager was Viorel Filimon, was made of Elizabeta Samara, Daniela Dodean, Bernadette Szőcs, Camelia Poştoacă, Alina Diaconu and Cristina Hîrîci. We should also note that Daniela Dodean was back into the game following a two years’ maternity leave. Ahead of the European table tennis championships in Ekaterinburg, Dodean had won all the five fixtures for Romania.

In Russia, Romania lost her fourth final in the last six years, after the ones in 2010, 2011, 2013, all fixtures against Germany. However, Romania’s record includes three European titles in the women’ s version of the competition, in 1992, 2002 and 2005.

Individual events are well under way at the ongoing European championships.