Table tennis record European champion Timo Boll is in danger of missing out on taking part in the team world championships in Busan/South Korea.
As the German Table Tennis Association announced on Thursday, just one day before the opener against the USA (Friday, 9 a.m. CET/Dyn), the 42-year-old is suffering from inflammation of the iris in his right eye. Boll will see a doctor on Friday, “we hope that he can still fly,” said DTTB sports director Richard Prause.
It would be Boll’s 21st World Cup participation; he has so far been denied a title as the crowning glory of his career. The other German players Dimitrij Ovtcharov, Dang Qiu, Patrick Franziska and Benedikt Duda already set off for distant Asia on Monday.
From Friday to Monday there are four preliminary round games for the DTTB men. The tournament ends on February 25th. Former world number one Boll had said in advance that Busan could well be his last World Cup.
Boll, who recently won the WTT tournament in Doha, wanted to earn a ticket to the Olympics in Paris through good performances at the World Cup. It would be Boll’s seventh summer games.