Rollercoaster ride for Saarbrücken – Champions League win and division dampener
1. FC Saarbrücken Tischtennis have just had some of their most intensive days of play this season: first of all, the Champions League title holders battled their way to a hard-fought 3:2 in Poland – a win that laid crucial foundations despite player rotations. This was followed by a division setback against Bad Homburg, 2:3 after a 2:0 lead, a painful result during these tight weeks between Europe and the division. Overall, this paints a picture of a typical FCS autumn, with a blend of pressure, challenge and resilience.
October and November see 1. FC Saarbrücken Tischtennis in a period that often says more about a top team’s sporting profile than a commanding position in the table. These are the weeks where Saarland must defend their spot in Europe, gain league points and deal with a diminished squad. The two matches between Friday evening and Sunday lunchtime served as a condensed version of this: an intense, difficult Champions League away game in Poland – followed two days later by a Bundesliga duel that initially seemed certain and was then turned on its head.
In their first-round match for the last sixteen against Dojlidy Bialystok, Saarbrücken had to manage without top Chinese player Fan Zhendong and Truls Möregardh. ‘We are flying out to Poland on Thursday with Darko Jorgic, Patrick Franziska, Yuto Muramatsu and Cedric Meissner’, team manager Nicolas Barrois announced – an understandable rotation given the tight calendar. Fan Zhendong is due to make his Champions League debut at the second-leg match in mid-December: ‘And we are really looking forward to it’, Barrois said. However, the lack of both stars had an impact in Poland. Bialystok, with no big names but plenty of confidence, quickly developed a level of energy that the defending champions could rarely ignore for long.
We are flying out to Poland on Thursday with Darko Jorgic, Patrick Franziska, Yuto Muramatsu and Cedric Meissner
Team manager Nicolas Barrois
Darko Jorgic, the man who often carries this team during heated European fixtures, immediately stumbled in a difficult game. He lost 2:3 to Patryk Chojnowski – the player who would shape the evening’s events for the home team. Although Patrick Franziska and Yuto Muramatsu turned the match around with clear 3:0 defeats of Piotr Chodorski and Piotr Michalski, Chojnowski remained unperturbed. He beat first the world number eleven, then the number 21. Franziska was defeated 2:3 and the momentum seemed to have finally turned the other way. Jorgic only found his stride in the singles decider, beating Chodorski 3:1 to prevent a shock result that was well within reach.
This 3:2 gave Saarbrücken what is sometimes needed in knockout competitions: no glamour, just a result. ‘Things could be tricky against Dojlidy Białystok, as they have nothing to lose’, Jorgic said beforehand – and he was right. FCS ‘got off lightly’, as was aptly said after the match. But get through it they did, and during this current period, that is what matters. The second leg match is on 19 December at their home venue – where spectators can expect both the return and Champions League debut of Fan Zhendong.
Just 40 hours later, the team faced a Bundesliga match that felt like a polar opposite: a narrowly missed opportunity rather than a hard-fought away win. A surprising slip-up by table leaders Bremen on Sunday morning created a window that is rarely found in the battle for the top of the TTBL: a win against Bad Homburg would have put Saarbrücken at the top of the table for the first time this season. However, FCS were once again without Franziska and Fan Zhendong, Franziska because he was with his family in Sweden – and the doubles match at the end was lacking the stability and depth that this team usually displays.
Everything began perfectly. Yuto Muramatsu set the trend with 3:1 against Juan Perez and Jorgic upped this with a confident 3:0 against Csaba Andras. The score after two singles matches was 2:0, exactly the same as in the Champions League two days before – however, this time it was not the outsider that faltered, but the favourite. ‘I have always said that this will be one of our easiest matches’, Bad Homberg’s team manager Sven Rehde later noted – a comment that sounded a little like calculated optimism given how the first third of the event progressed.
However, the match was then turned on its head with painful consequences for Saarbrücken. Cedric Meissner was resoundingly defeated 0:3 by Benno Oehme – a result that particularly stung given the pair know many of each others’ strengths and weaknesses from long periods of training together. Oehme took advantage of this to clinch his first win of the season and set things off in a new direction. Ionescu began well and won the first set, but then lost to Andras in four sets. This made the doubles match the decider – and on the day, Bad Homburg proved better at tactically seeking out the more precise solution.
Coach Helmut Hampl deployed Igor Ban and Jo Yokotani (who did not play in the singles matches) for the final doubles. The plan worked. Meissner/Ionescu took the lead twice, winning the first and third sets, but Ban/Yokotani definitively turned the match around in the fourth set and systematically clinched the fifth. The 2:3 was perfect and Bad Homburg celebrated a win ‘that most top European teams can only dream of’.
For Saarbrücken, on the other hand, this felt like a stumbling block that came at a time where the team were already balancing focus, pressure and changing pace. They are now in third place with 10:6 points, behind Bremen and Düsseldorf. Rather than being a major drama, this is simply a setback – and one that occurred during a match that felt like it had an ideal starting point.
Nevertheless, Jorgic managed top-level play despite the stress of travelling, Muramatsu was a reliable scorer and the team remained solid despite the tight timings – all of which fits the overall picture of a team that has an international schedule unlike any other German team (apart from Düsseldorf). However, Sunday also showed how narrow the margins are when two key players are missing, how dependent a top TTBL team is on stability in three positions, and how losing a doubles match after a 2:0 lead can suddenly turn a game on its head.
These two fixtures have produced a realistic picture of Saarbrücken’s current sporting position: FCS remain on track in Europe and are still a top team in the Bundesliga. However, they are a top team that will need to pool their strengths in the coming weeks – and rejoice in the impending return of Fan Zhendong. Furthermore, December brings the second-leg match against Bialystok, which will be a highlight in terms of both sporting performance and atmosphere.