11. August 2024

With three Swiss National Teams competing for gold and glory at the Team World Championships in Rotterdam, the same number of teams competed as in the year before. Due to the sudden absence of Andreas Kotala, Flavio Wolf was promoted to the first Swiss Team competing in the World Cup, where he was joining Adeline Kilchenmann, Nicolas Lenggenhager, Léon Mamié and Noah Mamié. The second Swiss Team consisted of Nicole Eisler, Rafael Fritschi, Patrick Bürgi, Andreas Stoos and Riccardo Raimo. The third Swiss Team competing was the Seniors 55+ consisting of Graham King, Manfred Grab, Giovanni Gentile and Gregor Meyer. 

The Seniors team started their campaign first, with a match against Great Britain. The Swiss managed to secure the victory with a +7 margin, ensuring them to take part in the medal fight. Next up they had an extremely tight match against the Swedish team, going all the way in tennis. Giovanni Gentile put on a strong performance in the last tennis set, but unfortunately it was not quite good enough and the Swiss team just fell short to secure the victory. This result meant, that the Swiss were to face their longtime rival Germany in a playoff for the bronze medal. Despite all their best efforts the Germans were once more too strong for the Swiss team, which meant that the Swiss had to settle for an unfortunate 4^thplace, nevertheless they showed great team spirit and put on a fight. 

The first Swiss team competing in the World Cup were drawn into a group with Germany, Sweden and Austria, which turned out to be a challenging draw for the team. Although the team fought hard and gave it their best, with every player competing at their highest level, they had clear losses against the German and Swedish team. Hopes were high for the Swiss team to be able to secure victory against the Austrian team, which consisted out of mainly juniors. The Swiss team managed to get into tennis slightly ahead of the Austrians, knowing this will be a hard victory to get due to the strength of the Austrians in tennis. Nicolas and Adeline fought hard for ever point but unfortunately lost their sets, meaning that the doubles would need to win to keep the Swiss chances alive. Flavio and Léon produced a fantastic tennis set meaning, managing to beat the Austrians 11-7, meaning Noah would need to get at least 6 points against Schöpf for the Gummiarm. Schöpf showed what a great tennis player he is and left Noah no chance to reach those 6 points. There wasn’t a lot of time for misery, since now it was clear that the Swiss team had to play against Hongkong to keep the World Cup spot for next year. Hongkong proved to be harder to beat as the Austrians for the Swiss, which means that the Team will have to play in the Nations Cup next year trying to regain the World Cup spot. It is still worth mentioning that the team gave it their best and showed some great performances.

The second team had a very easy first round draw, with the Czech team consisting mainly of parents from junior players. The upcoming quarterfinal match against Norway was already suspected to be a very close encounter and what a nailbiter it turned out to be. With Nicole playing in the team, she managed to win her match by quite a large margin, while the men tried to get as many points as possible against some very well-rounded Norwegian players. The match was very close from the get-go and therefore headed into the last tennis. The Norwegians only needed 4 points in tennis to secure victory, but Riccardo went into that match with full confidence that he can still win it for Switzerland, and he was not wrong about that. He managed to win tennis 11-3 meaning a Gummiarm had to decide on who wins the tie. Luck did not mean it well with forcing Riccardo to serve but as cool as a cucumber he took on the challenge. After a close but in serve the rally started but it was not too long until a slice of the Norwegian player landed behind the baseline meaning Switzerland won the tie and was now in the semifinal of the Challenge Cup. In the semifinal not a lot of crumbs were left for the Swiss team against a very strong GB4 team, who went on to win the Challenge cup. Due to unfortunate planning on the Swiss side, the team couldn’t compete for the bronze medal.

The overall take away was that although the results from the team competition seem disappointing with the relegation from the World Cup and two fourth places, the Swiss players all gave it their best and fought hard for every point. Which always is the most important part, especially considering that some players had to play in higher teams than intended, where they got heavily challenged. 

Therefore, once again congratulations to all the players especially the medal winners and a big thanks to everyone who helped organize the tournament or did other work for the sport during the tournament!

DL

PS: Thank you Dara, for stepping in and play for team II and thank you, Sharon & Marina for baby sitting.

NE

11. August 2024

15 Swiss Racketlon players traveled to Rotterdam for the 2nd edition of the Racketlon Singles and Team World Championships at the Victoria Squash & Tennis Center. Absent is Andreas Kotala, who had to stay at home due to appendicitis. This is particularly unfortunate as Andreas would have been the top favorite in the U16 category and was due to make his debut in the elite team.

Adeline Kilchenmann represented Switzerland in the women's elite. She won her opening match thanks to a clear 21:4 in badminton against Steph Chung (USA). In round 2, she then lost to last year’s world champion Nathalie Vogel (GER) and finished in 7th/8th place.

Nicole Eisler represented Switzerland in the senior women's +40 category for the first time and eliminated top seed Kirsten Kaptein (NED) from the tournament in the first round. In the semi-finals and final, the most successful Swiss racketlon player and new mother marched to the world championship title without any discussion or tennis. Bravo Nicole!

In the men's elite, Noah Mamié and Nicolas Lenggenhager won their opening matches convincingly before being stopped in the round of 16 by Kresten Hougaard (DEN) and Jürg Kanonenberg (GER). In the subsequent placement matches, they both lost by wafer-thin margins and finish in 13th to 16th place. Kanonenberg eliminated Léon Mamié in round 1, who later finished in 25th to 28th place.

Due to the absence of Andreas Kotala, only Flavio Wolf is competing for Switzerland in the men's B event. He loses his first two matches against Li and Fung from Hong Kong before just managing to fend off last place against Krog (DEN).

Riccardo Raimo, Giovanni Gentile and Patrick Bürgi all won their opening matches in the men's C category. Gentile only fails in round 3, Raimo and Bürgi in round 2, while Marc-André-Rauber loses in round 1.

In the men's D category, Andreas Stooss wins his first-round match after a huge comeback in rubber-arm tennis. He is then defeated by Motasha from India in round 2.

In the First Timers, Nicole Eisler’s husband and new dad Rafael Fritschi can celebrate his first Racketlon victory after losing his opening match in the placement matches. Is this the start of a great career?

Switzerland is represented four times in the senior +55 category. Manfred Grab and Gregor Meyer were narrowly defeated by Janzer (HUN) in rounds 2 & 3. Giovanni Gentile fights his way through to round 3 in the other half of the tableau before losing to Lau (GBR). Marc-André-Rauber loses in round 1.

Record player Graham King represents Switzerland for the first time in the +70 seniors. He wins his group of 3 convincingly and is then only defeated by Hesselbjerg (DEN) in the medal fight. Congratulations to Graham on his well-deserved Vice World Champion title!

FW