The German Table Tennis Association (DTTB) announced the result of the online vote for 2021, which was only carried out in the past two weeks, on Tuesday. Like Boll, the two-time European champion Nina Mittelham (Berlin) repeated her electoral success from the previous year in the women’s category.
Victory ahead of Ovtcharov and Baus
World Championship bronze medalist Boll clearly relegated 37.4 percent of the votes to Olympic bronze medalist Dimitrij Ovtcharov (Hameln/Orenburg/23.4 percent) in second place. Third place went to Paralympic winner Valentin Baus (Düsseldorf/21.5). Last year’s winner Patrick Franziska (Saarbrücken), who won team silver with Boll and Ovtcharov at the Olympic Games in Tokyo last summer, only came fourth with 8.0 percent of the votes despite his Europe Top 16 success.
In the women’s category, European Champion Petrissa Solja (Langstadt) took second place ahead of Han Ying (Düsseldorf/Tarnobrzeg), who placed fifth at the Olympics.
Achievements at the Olympics, World Championships and European Championships plus club triple
The participants in the survey obviously rated Boll’s numerous successes again in the previous year higher than Ovtcharov’s second individual medal at the Olympics. In addition to team silver in Tokyo at the record age of over 40 years, Boll also won his eighth European Championship title in Warsaw in the summer in Warsaw and in the fall in Houston/Texas, despite a torn abdominal muscle, he won his second World Championship medal in singles through bronze.
Boll’s hunger for success is far from satisfied
With record champions Borussia Düsseldorf, the crowd’s favorite once again won the “triple” with successes in the league, cup and Champions League. However, Boll’s thirst for success does not seem to have been satisfied by a long shot. “Excited to see what 2022 will bring, I’m working hard and I’m confident that if health and fitness play a part I can continue to do a lot“, the world number one commented on his election success.
Source: sid