Hello from ITTF President

[adham]

Zitat von Tackiness

Here's a first question for you that surely many are interested in:
Will there soon be an improved ENEZ device that can detect boosters? Surely you cannot be happy about the current situation where many pros seem to "cheat", and no one can do anything about it - at least that's what happened at the recent European championship.

Zitat von Mark Neef

Dear Mr. Sharara,
welcome here in "TT News"
A few months ago the ITTF introduced the new friction-rule for pimples.
I respect this decision but I think it was wrong and brings more damage to our beloved sport than it is useful. We want to play table tennis and after the matches we want to drink a beer (or two) and we don't want to discuss about things like friction of pimples or other difficult rules which can't be measured objectively and exactly in a gym. Such complicated and not comprehensible rules are poison for our sport!
Please take them back as soon as possible.

A few months ago you have written in a letter that you want to support the defensive style fundamentally. Up to now I couldn't note anything of that. On the contrary, recently you banned the racket coverings of "TT-Master"
because of production fluctuations. A lot of players use these as a substitute for slippery long pimples. Does your promised help look like this?
Best regards,
Mark Neef

The friction level established by the ITTF was presented to the ITTF at the apropriate meeting and was debated by all the delegates present and then a vote was taken and the proposal passed. In the view of the majority that passed this proposal they believe, as I do, that it was to "improve" the game and to disallow the post-treatment of rubbers which is a form of cheating. Unfortunately some manufacturers were producing ready made low friction or so-called frictionless rubber because there is a demand. When the new rule passed several of these rubbers did not meet the minimum friction criteria if the ITTF and therefore did not make the new authorization list. This is NOT against any specific manufacturer and it is not against defensive players. This is a question of setting standards and setting criteria that the majority of the members of the ITTF (national associations) believe it os in favour of the sport. It is your right to believe the opposite of course. Time will tell who is right. The delegates at the ITTf are not stupid, if after a year or two they realize that this rule should be changed back they will do it. But we must give enough time to see the effects. We had mush stronger opposition to the 40mm ball and the 11 points games, but today there is general agreement that these were good changes.
But, you are right that the friction rule has caused a lot of problems to tyhe players at the lower levels in clubs and leagues, while it had no effect on the top players. I am very soory about that. But I firmly believe that players should rely on their own skills and hone those skills to be better players and use equipment only as a question of comfort and as a matter of fitting their style of play, rather than using equipment (and altering) to gain advantage. This is my personal belief. I also believe that defensive players should be able to make a comeback now that we no longer have VOC glues and if we control the use of boosters better in the future. The door has opened for defensive players to come up with their skills, with some help from equipment, but not to rely entirely on equipment.
As for the detection of cheaters at the club level, all I can tell you is that cheaters will alwys be cheaters, but I dream of a day that all TT players can respect the rules based on the honour system.

[adham]

But, you are right that the friction rule has caused a lot of problems to the players at the lower levels in clubs and leagues, while it had no effect on the top players. I am very sorry about this. But I firmly believe that players should rely on their own skills and hone those skills to be better players and use equipment only as a question of comfort and as a matter of fitting their style of play, rather than using equipment (and altering it) to gain advantage. This is my personal belief. I also believe that defensive players should be able to make a comeback now that we no longer have VOC glues and if we control the use of boosters better in the future. The door has opened for defensive players to come up with their skills, with some help from equipment, but not to rely entirely on equipment. As for the detection of cheaters at the club level, cheaters will always be cheaters; I dream of a day that all TT players can respect the rules based on the honour system.

[adham]

@Ghosttalker

Your English is fine and it is much better than my German. In fact, I do remember receiving your message and I was sure that I answered you. But I do not keep these answers, so perhaps you are right (I answer more than 300 e-mails per day). Let me try to answer you now:

Actually I try to answer all e-mails I receive if they are polite. I am sorry if I missed your e-mail.

You are right about the reason to establish a minimum friction level, it is to control the level of the surface of the rubber and to avoid post-************** treatment and to have a standard that all can follow. You are also right that this rule did not affect the top players.

Yes, I am aware that this rule has highlighted the cheaters and that many players try to get rubbers that do not meet our rules. This is the same as in doping in sport, unfortunately the honour system in sports seems to be disappearing.

I am very sorry that you consider that you wasted 3 years and that when you found a new substitute this also was banned. I feel very bad for you. But when a rule is changed these are the consequences on the generation that lives through the rule change. At the ITTF we must think of the future of our sport as well. Imagine those players that played with speed glue for more than 20 years and now have to adapt to water-base glues. Unfotunately it affcets this generation, yours and mine, but the ITTF must think long term and we sinverely believe that we are doing the right thing. If we are wrong, we will change the rule for the best interest of our sport. Let me explain why a rubber could be authorized and then later lose the authorization. Initial tests are made on samples provided by the manufacturer. Then periodically we test the rubbers taken from the retail market (shops), and sometimes we find irregularities and the samples do not meet the ITTF criteria. We inform the manufacturer and try to make corrections to the problem. But sometimes the manufacturer refuses and says that the ITTF is wrong, then we have a long standing argument about it. But in most cases the manufacturers are very good and they try to correct the problem.

The Wright brothers made fools of themselves, Gallileo made a fool of himself and many visionaries also made fools of themselves. The ITTF was also a fool with the 40mm ball and the 11-points and the new service rule and the yearly world championships, etc., etc. I prefer to be a fool with a vision than a bureaucrat with no vision.

We allow a rubber as long as it meets our criteria, and we do not give the authorization when it does NOT meet the criteria, it is a consistent, regular and simple procedure. You know that millions of products are recalled by governments after they receive initial approval. But if on further inspection the product is found not to meet the specific criteria it is removed. This is normal.

You have a very good point about allowing frictionless rubber and making it legal. maybe this is the solution. but first a national association must propose this new rule and the majority at the ITTF meeting must vote in favour. I welcome such a proposal, but I do not decide. In fact, I do not have a vote at the Annual general meeting and I only have the deciding vote (if the vote is 50%-50%) at the Board of Directors. I personally have no problem with your proposal.

TT- master has gone to court and this is fully their right and I respect it. If the judge rules in favour of TT-Master we will of course follow the ruling as the judge states it. In the contrary happens, then we will still work with TT-Master as an important part of the Table tennis family and we will do all we can to help them.

You are right, Enez cannot detect everything and always someone will cheat. Just like the IOC cannot detect every drug taken by athletes and always someone will cheat. So? Does that mean we abandon in what we believe and allow everything so that we have no problems? This would be like the IOC saying "we always have cheaters so we will no longer test for drugs". No, this is not the naswer. The answer is that we need better detecting equipment and we need to educate young players to be honest and follow the rules. And if the rule changes, then OK, welcome, no problem.

It makes no difference if we put a sign "Tested by ITTF", we really do not know what the players use, we never new even when we had approved glue. How can we check what they use at the source? The only thing we can do is test the rackets and impose very strict and severe penalties to stop the players from using illegal substances.

I am sorry that you are so frustrated, I hope you take your racket and go hit some TT balls hard and fast to get your frustration out. I applaud your passion and concern and I hope that you have the patience to ride through this transition time. I am sure that a year from now we will not have such a severe problem after a reasonable adaptation period.

Thank you for your time, and I hope I don't miss your next personal e-mail.

Adham

[Neptune]

Hello Mr. Sharara,

nice to "see" you here.

The ban of frictionless long pimples was the biggest mistake the ITTF ever made. That ban really helps nobody and the only thing it causes is a lot of trouble during the matches. Everyone knew what would happen after the ban and actually now you find lots of frictionless long pimples. A lot of players are used to play with frictionless long pimples for many years and those players are not willing to play without that material. They did spend a lot of money and time to get used to play with that kind of material. There was absolutely no need for this ban.
Now people make there own frictionless long pimples or buy them from stores (what a business). There is no method to identify those rubbers and there will be no serious method. Even if there would be a testset it wouldn't help at all. If a player after a test says "Your long pimples are illegal" the other player says " They are legal" or "They are legal. Your testset fails/ Your testset is modified/You are doing the wrong measurement" or "Your inward pimpled rubbers are boostert" and so on.... In every way you put it, trouble would be THE ONLY effect and there is absolutely no solution. Even a ban of all long pimples wouldn't help at all, because players would use anti spin rubbers or short pimles and modify them, which would be no problem at all. I have already seen modified inward pimpled rubbers with the same effect as frictionless long pimples (some players want to make sure that they must not buy new rubbers again in case of a new ban). And there is no chance to ban inward pimpled rubbers or to set a special friction level for those rubbers. With a special friction level for inward pimpled rubbers the ITTF would anger a VERY BIG AMOUNT of players and make them stop playing table tennis. That would be definitely the end for our sport!!!
I cannot believe that this is what the ITTF really wants but the situation is getting more and more out of control. The ITTF doesn't see the base no more and forgets the large variety of the sport, that makes/made table tennis so interesting for us.

The only way to stop this very frustrating situation (for all sides) would be to take back the rashly and needless ban of frictionless long pimples and allow those rubbers again.


Sorry for my bad English.

Best regards

[TSC]

Neptune, going into details of your post would take a loong time but let me just say that adaptions to the rules such as the ones that we experience in tabletennis currently happen in every sport and all the time to control the development. Until just a few years ago, tabletennis (similar to the world finance business) has experienced little regulation with the results that you're surely aware of.
In a sport like tabletennis where the material of each player plays such a vital role finding (and enforcing) rules that a) keep the sport "steady" and b) allow individuality of each player is a very difficult path that the regulating body has to go through. The creation of such rules within the special, aforementioned characteristics of the sport after the many years of deregulation leads sadly to players that don't seem to bother about the new rules and find weak spots (read: they cheat) in order to keep up. There may be seemingly endless ways for those without morals to cheat but is the lack of a 100% enforcement of the rules and the frustration of players a reason for not implementing (and therefore subsequently hindering the development of the sport) them?

I used to be frustrated by the many players (usually low level amateurs) that don't seem to care about rules but found a simple solution: I either don't play against/with them and I don't bother about them. I'm also more determined than ever to beat them solely with my playing abilities. And if I loose, so what? I got some angry looks from the folks in my club after my announcement that I'm not going to play in my team if the other guy doesn't stop using the illegal pimples but again, I don't care. I do care about morals though. If I keep them up then there's nothing to complain about (except if I play bad).

@ Adham: the only question that I have to you is why it took so long to take countermeasures against speed glue as you've mentioned that it has been in use for more than 20 years. Wasn't the outcome foreseeable (sooner or later)?

[Benjy]

Hey,

after what I read here, this sounds not sooo bad.

But the "base" is in a bad mood. In every club I was in the last year, there was always some "moaning" on the new rules, regardless if it was about frictionless pimples or speed-glueing.

The fact that I am very interessted in, is why were these changes really necessary. Someone somewhere in the world sniffed to hard on the speed-glue and got seriosly injured. So what? Cigarretes, Cars, ect. are all dangerous and when we try to ban all things that can harm us, we will end up in a sort of padded room.
But, after all, there WAS a reason (even if I still do not understand it).

With frictionless pimples, there was absolutely NO reason. They did not harm anyone. In fact, they limitate the player who uses them more than they help. So why did an international commitee bother?

In times when politicians lie several times a day, no "small" man believes in the "best means" of the government. So even if you indeed tried to make the sport better (there is no argument that states how these rules will do this!), no one belives it. It is just a phrase to answer all the nasty questions that come up from "amateur players".

But after all, I stand with you in one thing: If there are rules, than everyone has to play after that rules. Trying to cheat will always kick honesty in the ass. I think your point about doping is a good one, since there still are drugs that cannot be detected. So this would mean to allow all drugs just because there may yet not be detectors for some of them?

But on the other hand, drugs may not be the right compare. If I have a physical limitation, that I can break with drugs, then this cannot be compared to table-tennis. Even with a cheated rubber I still have to play against my opponent. So in my opinion, there should be free choosing "the weapon of choice". So why is this so difficult?

Greets

[Benjy]

Zitat von adham

...
But we must give enough time to see the effects. We had mush stronger opposition to the 40mm ball and the 11 points games, but today there is general agreement that these were good changes.
...

Are you really serious?

If this indeed were good changes, than it would be easy for you to tell us what the outcome of these "good changes" was.

Well, that the industry sold many new balls, because everyone needed new ones doesn't count.

In order to be able to tell that these changes were good, you need to have a compare. Something like: Half of the world played after the new rules, the other half with the old rules. The half with the new rules had a significant raise in member-ship countet against the other half.

To make rules and wait for some years until no one really can remember the time before the changes and than state, that the changes were good is easy. Because no one can proove that you are wrong. On the other hand, can you bring proove that the changes really were good?

[Neptune]

Zitat von TSC

Neptune, going into details of your post would take a loong time but let me just say that adaptions to the rules such as the ones that we experience in tabletennis currently happen in every sport and all the time to control the development. Until just a few years ago, tabletennis (similar to the world finance business) has experienced little regulation with the results that you're surely aware of.
In a sport like tabletennis where the material of each player plays such a vital role finding (and enforcing) rules that a) keep the sport "steady" and b) allow individuality of each player is a very difficult path that the regulating body has to go through. The creation of such rules within the special, aforementioned characteristics of the sport after the many years of deregulation leads sadly to players that don't seem to bother about the new rules and find weak spots (read: they cheat) in order to keep up. There may be seemingly endless ways for those without morals to cheat but is the lack of a 100% enforcement of the rules and the frustration of players a reason for not implementing (and therefore subsequently hindering the development of the sport) them?

I used to be frustrated by the many players (usually low level amateurs) that don't seem to care about rules but found a simple solution: I either don't play against/with them and I don't bother about them. I'm also more determined than ever to beat them solely with my playing abilities. And if I loose, so what? I got some angry looks from the folks in my club after my announcement that I'm not going to play in my team if the other guy doesn't stop using the illegal pimples but again, I don't care. I do care about morals though. If I keep them up then there's nothing to complain about (except if I play bad).

@ Adham: the only question that I have to you is why it took so long to take countermeasures against speed glue as you've mentioned that it has been in use for more than 20 years. Wasn't the outcome foreseeable (sooner or later)?

TSC, I'm sorry, but I don't understand your comments. You are talking about "usually low level amateurs". Why are you doing that? Are you a profi playing against those low level amateurs that are now playing soooo high with their frictionless long pimples? So why are you calling frictionless long pimples players "low level amateurs"? People like you are the reason for this ban.

Also you are talking about moral. PLEASE TELL ME WHERE YOUR MORAL IS!?
I couldn't believe what you wrote in another threat:

Zitat von TSC
"Diese Material-Nazis (Lies: Spieler) kotzen mich echt an".

Sorry TSC, but I cannot take you as a competent person (though your English is better than mine).

[adham]

@TSC

You've said it all my friend, you've said it all !! Thank you. You said it much better than I would. I thank you for answering Neptune.

Regarding the long time it took to ban VOC glues was mainly related to two factors:
1. A strong and large group within the ITTF opposing such a ban and always working against any movement towards banning VOC glues in fear of ruining the sport
2. developing affordable and reliable testing equipment that would detect ALL VOCs.

With regards to the first point, as time passed, as the smell increased, as governments and health agencies and health practitioners started to sound the alarm, as studies were produced, as the ugly spectacle of players gathered in an area gluing with ventilators and some with masks increased, as the IOC Agenda 21 came to the forth, and as the top players themselves started to realize the health hazards, less and less opposition was found within the ITTF. Finally in 2004 based on a proposal from Japan the total ban of VOCs was passed with initial implementation for 2006, then postponed to after the Olympics in 2008.

I believe that the VOC glue ban is not an issue, this aspect will be history very soon. The challenge is the use of boosters and other additives that according to current ITTF rules are illegal. As of January 2009 special detection instruments will be introduced to detect such additives, and the ITTF is working closely with manufacturers to stop the production of such substances. But as you said, there will always be those that will find their own substances and and tinker with their equipment to gain advantage. It takes all kinds to make a world.

Neptune mentioned the intricacies of the low-friction rubber. As I read his comments I could not help but think, it's a good thing the ITTF set some standard. In my opinion this issue will pass over time as legal and according to the rule ITTF authorized equipment is developed by the manufacturers (as they always do).

But there is one important element that is often forgotten. Without speed glue, without boosters, the power of offensive players has been reduced. This is an opportunity for the rise of the defensive player, without the need of special equipment to counter the previously devastating attacks possible with speed glue.

I am optimistic, and you made my day sir. Thank you again.

Adham

[adham]

Zitat von Benjy

On the other hand, can you bring proof that the changes really were good?

Yes of course I can bring proof. First, what was the main objective of the 40mm ball and the 11 points games? The main objective was to make Table Tennis more TV friendly. Did we achieve that?
- In 1992 in Barcelona Olympics Table tennis ranked by IOC 24th out of 26 sports as far as TV viewers worldwide are concerned
- In 2004 in Athens, the IOC ranked TT 5th out of 28 sports
- For 2008, we have only partial results and statistics but already based on this partial results TT is ranked 4th out of 28 sports (we hope to end up even higher).

Before the year 2000 the ITTF did not have any major non-table tennis sponsors. Now we have Volkswagen, Liebherr, China Unicom, etc. They must realize that TT is more visible and provides a good investment.

In 1999 we had 175 member national association, now we have 205.

A player from Paraguay reached the semi-final at the ITTF World Cadet Challenge last week, this same player was undefeated in the Team events beating players from Korea, Japan, France, England, etc. At the same event, in the World Junior category a player from Egypt reached the final. Would that be possible 10 years ago?

If we used your comparative method to measure progress, then the USA should have elected 2 presidents, divided the USA population in 2, have each half follow one president and after 4 years decide who did better. I prefer to measure progress and improvemnet by comparing the state of affairs at one period in time, with the state of affairs, using the same criteria, in another period in time. This is more practical, don't you think?

In any case, I have to agree with you that any measure of success remains a question of statistics and opinions. My statistics show that ITTF influenced in improving our sport, and my opinion is unfortunately biased, I am the president of the ITTF after all.

Adham