Hello from ITTF President

[Torsten von Bayern]

Thank you Adham, I would like to confirm that it IS helpful. Faulty services can be produced deliberately or not, and the latter is more often the case than one might think.

When this happens, players should not think of the umpire as a person so untouchable that the player is not allowed to speak to him/her. The umpire is the person in charge of fair and structured match conduct. This includes making sure that the players know what they may do and what they may not. It is in nobody's interest that a player does a match being uncertain about a law or regulation. Therefore, as an umpire, I appreciate any calm and polite question of a player, because in responding to his/her question I can improve match conduct for ALL four parties: the two players or pairs, the spectators and the umpire.

It is of course the umpire's duty to distinguish between a real and an unfair question (for example in terms of when and how the question is made) - but this should be part of the umpire's training.

[adham]

Zitat von Torsten von Bayern

Thank you Adham, I would like to confirm that it IS helpful. Faulty services can be produced deliberately or not, and the latter is more often the case than one might think.

When this happens, players should not think of the umpire as a person so untouchable that the player is not allowed to speak to him/her. The umpire is the person in charge of fair and structured match conduct. This includes making sure that the players know what they may do and what they may not. It is in nobody's interest that a player does a match being uncertain about a law or regulation. Therefore, as an umpire, I appreciate any calm and polite question of a player, because in responding to his/her question I can improve match conduct for ALL four parties: the two players or pairs, the spectators and the umpire.

It is of course the umpire's duty to distinguish between a real and an unfair question (for example in terms of when and how the question is made) - but this should be part of the umpire's training.

Absolutely right !

Adham

[123abc]

Hello Adham,

there are rumours that say that long pimples are going to be banned in the future. Is this right?

[adham]

Zitat von 123abc

Hello Adham,

there are rumours that say that long pimples are going to be banned in the future. Is this right?

Frankly I have not heard these rumours, I am sure that they are just rumours and nothing else. In fact, pimples are an integral part of Table tennis and opart of our history and our present. The ITTF established a minimum friction level for rubbers, applied to pimpled rubbers, and that is all. Any pimpled rubber that meets the rules of the ITTF is here to stay. I would dispel these false rumours, there will always be pimpled rubbers in table tennis and in the ITTF rules as far as I can see.

Thank you for asking.

Adham

[Mighty]

Zitat von adham

Frankly I have not heard these rumours, I am sure that they are just rumours and nothing else. In fact, pimples are an integral part of Table tennis and opart of our history and our present. The ITTF established a minimum friction level for rubbers, applied to pimpled rubbers, and that is all. Any pimpled rubber that meets the rules of the ITTF is here to stay. I would dispel these false rumours, there will always be pimpled rubbers in table tennis and in the ITTF rules as far as I can see.

Thank you for asking.

Adham

@Adham

Just imagine, the same idea slightly changed a few years ago. Instead of "pimpled rubbers" - 38mm ball or hidden service, or speed glue, or frictionless pimples, or 21 points.

Of course, this time things are completely different.

Need I really to explain to you, that any time any Association can make a proposition? And then the Associations will vote?

[Nullinger]

Dear Mr.Sharara,

it is great, that you participate in this forum.
I haven't read all the posts, so I don't know, if these two topics were already discussed, but I want to address them anyway.

As I understand, the ITTF wants to increase the popularity of Table Tennis, particularly on TV. I think, one major problem, why it is not very enjoyable to watch (for a non-player like my girlfriend for instance) is that the camera views and slowmotions. They are often from weird angles and slowmotions don't really help, because TT is too fast.
I remember one fairly good counterexample, I believe it was the Olympic Games in Beijing.

Did the ITTF think about trying to influence, HOW TT is shown on TV?
Trying to influence that more cameras for different angles are used and maybe special equipment for better (higher resolution) slowmotions?
I guess, it is difficult to enforce something that costs TV stations money to show a sport they are not particularly interested in in the first place.

Then there is something else that strikes me:
for Table Tennis we have (as in Tennis) team leagues and singles tournaments. It seems to me, for both it is wanted to increase the popularity on TV. Tennis for instance is only popular for the ATP tour, hence singles tournaments. Only Tennis players follow the leagues, which might be - similar to TT - due to the fact, that it is not a real team sport, but a group of singles and doubles players, whose results are counted together.
What I think should be propagated more is to show the tournaments on TV. Push the Pro Tour, count the tournaments and points the players gather to qualify for the Grand Finals (as for the "Masters" in Tennis). I think that promises more success than to show league matches.
What do you think?

Once again, I highly appreciate that you take your valuable time to listen to us here. This, honestly, makes me love Table Tennis even more! (Could you imagine Joseph Blatter participate in a Spanish soccer forum? )

Kind regards,
Dirk Breitbach

Edit: after rereading my post, I guess it is actually just one topic...

[Fastest115]

Zitat von Mighty

@Adham

Just imagine, the same idea slightly changed a few years ago. Instead of "pimpled rubbers" - 38mm ball or hidden service, or speed glue, or frictionless pimples, or 21 points.

Of course, this time things are completely different.

Need I really to explain to you, that any time any Association can make a proposition? And then the Associations will vote?

I can only agree to Mighty.

Imagine its 1988. Somebody tells the president of the ITTF: In 20 Years we will play with a 40 mm Ball in Sets to 11....do you think he will say: Yes I think so, too...or would he say: No never????

I agree to the other argument , too. How can you say, that this "change" will not come. This decission is not yours alone. If any Association will made such a proposition and the majority of the other countries agrees then it will come!!!

For me there are still too much changes in the rules in the last years and the last two changes (VOC and less friction pimples) are destroying the style I like to play. I play with unglued pimples in rubbers as good as with fritionless pimples out on one side. But I have to change the style to play. The ball doesnt go more than 3 times over the net in one point, if I want to play successfully that style. That style brings no fun to me.

So I think I will not longer play table tennis in officiel team competition or tournaments.

There are other possibilities to play table tennis without the ITTF rules for racket material. This I will use. Maybe sometimes if my team use me 3 times a year then I take a ITTF ruled racket and play to help them.

And I´m not alone with this way of thinking. A lot of people think this way too. And if a lot of people will stop playing table tennis in ITTF ruled competition...do you think that this will be good for table tennis?

I think at all the ITTF and the most Associations they only think about the 1000 professional tabletennisplayers in the world and about main events, Mayor Leages and what is good for more TV time....nobody think about what such changes will do with the millions of players in lower leages. They are the base....

[Footsteps]

Adham im not sure this has been asked before, so please forgive my ignorance.

Can you put it in a nutshell:

1. Why are frictionless Pimples banned but frictionless Rubbers still allowed?

2. And as a followup, why were frictionless pimples banned in the firstplace?

(since the ITTF only cares about the top international game with regard to rules governing and at that level of play frictionless pimples used to be non existant and were considered a joke)




/almost offtopic (not so serious part):

Oh and since it is Chrismas:
Can we please ban any frictionless playing material to achive consistancy within the Rules? Else i will use glass as a racket covering, wich, this may come as a surprise to you, is entirely possible. I can also further enhance that glass surface with a nano technology cover so it will deterr water and clean itself which is also state of the art technology. Can i use that? No Pimples involved at all, i promise. ther's also room for an ITTF approval stamp.

Seriously if Table Tennis was big enough for Nike or Addidas or Speedo, you would start to see matrerial that blows your mind away so i would be quick on getting the rules ironed out because if by some magic tabletennis becomes really big, we are in trouble. Best material scientist wins.

[Nullinger]

Zitat von Footsteps

Adham im not sure this has been asked before, so please forgive my ignorance.

Well, I'd say, this thread mainly discussed low-friction long pimples and somewhere recently adham said, he will try to answer, why this rule does not apply to inverted pimples rubbers.

And, as adham already mentioned: it is not a ban of certain rubber types. It's a minimum friction level that is required.

As someone who loved to play against people with low-friction long pimples (not that I always won, but I just liked the variety of different shots such a game provided), I am a bit disappointed by this rule. However, it has been discussed in this thread over and over again and we are "turning in circles".

[Footsteps]

The minimum friction rule is not applied to RUBBERS. Its applied to PIMPLES only. Why?

(Antispin / Antitop is unaffected by the new rules)

I hope adham can answer these questions briefly (in a nutshell).

I would also suggest for a moderator to create some sort of a FAQ on the most significant statements adham makes here as president of the ITTF so he doesn't have to tell the same story over and over again, but i am to lazy to flicker through 16 pages of ranting against the frictionless pimples ban just to find the one sensible line that i am looking for.