Is Waldner arrogant?

[sVeNd]

but him being arrogant can also be a great motivation for his opponents..

[yoshi]

@sVeNd

Do you think players need to be motivated to play against the likes of a JO Waldner ?

More often than not, arrogance is measured by success. As long as someone keeps winning people say that they are confident when they start losing its arrogance.
Now that Waldner is past his prime such statements sound a little bit out of line, I am just wondering if he had said it 10 years ago, when he was a cut above the rest, would anybody doubt it or consider it arrogant ?
Another thing is cultural difference. What is being considered arrogant differes from one country to the next. I understand that this was an interview given in China, so maybe Mr. Waldner just knows the Chinese set of mind better than we do ?

[sVeNd]

Originally posted by yoshi
@sVeNd

Do you think players need to be motivated to play against the likes of a JO Waldner ?

i think that such a self-evaluation can be an extra motivation but in general you´re right, of course.

[Cissai]

Hi!
Many people say he is the best tt-player in the world. So, if someone is asking him: Who is the best player? He can´t say, he isn´t a great player and says only the names of other players.
In my opinion he answered the questions correctly.

[Tony_Iommi]

Hi together,

I have to admit that I'm not very familiar with Waldners habits.
But maybe he just took the word (genius) because it was used
in the question.

From my personal point of view, it IS arrogant to call hisself a "genius", for what reason ever.

But as I mentioned before, he might just took the word and meant something less "arrogant".

Cheers

Tony

[TT Duke]

Well, Waldner is/was the most genius player so far, wasn`t he ?

[al9021]

Waldner is a good player, but he were on the top when the Chinese were absents; now, Vladimir Samsonov is better than Jan Ove Waldner and he is on the top with the chinese Kong Linghui, Wang Liqin, Ma Lin, Liu Guozheng and Liu Guoliang. Waldner has the biggest palmares.

[hangman]

Well, in my opinion, Mr. Waldner could be something like a genius.

BUT, then he shouldn´t play "ping-pong", like he did at the GO in Bayreuth last year. To me, it looked like he was drunk, loosing 0:4 against Samsonov. No fighting, no playing, just nothing.

And if someone plays like this in a semi-final, he shouldn´t call himself a genius, because if he was one, he wouldn´t play like this.

So in this case, he seems to be arrogant (to me).

Other wise, he is a world class top player since, i don´t know... 1985 ??? Do you remember all Chinese world class players who played in this time ??? and i don´t know if only ONE resists as long as Waldner....

[Marc]

with "pingpong" managing to enter the semifinale in a pro tour event?? :confused:

[Dorit]

In the round before he made a wonderful match against Timo Boll and the games before were also good if not he wouldn`t have reached the semifinal I guess. Maybe he didn`t feel good this day. Even a genius can´t produce brilliant ideas,or in this case brilliant games, all the time.