(by Steve Hopkins, photo WTT)
Europe’s rising stars are competing this week at the 2025 European U21 Championships in Bratislava, Slovakia. Under 21 events are sometimes a mixed bag in regard to gauging future talent – as some number of the top players have already “graduated” to the senior circuit. So, for instance, Felix Lebrun at 17 years old is the highest ranked junior in Europe (and the highest ranked European on the tour). And World No. 1 Lin Shidong is just 20, and he won’t be competing in the Asian Under 21 Championships.
That said, age 21 is where most players begin to peak and this sort of event will give a preview to names we’ll begin to see on the Tour as well as some insight into which country’s programs are developing the most players. To that first point, past winners of this tournament have included tour regulars Tomislav Pucar, Tomas Polansky, and Vladimir Sidorenko. And an interesting note regarding which country’s have the best junior programs – four of the final eight U21 men were from Romania and two of the final four U21 women are Romanian as well.
In U21 Men’s Singles, Spain’s Miguel Pantoja entered the elimination round as the top seed by virture of upsetting Ionescu in the group rounds – and he has advanced to the Semifinals with relative ease. France’s Flavien Coton has also been dominant, and Coton and Pantoja will face each other on Sunday morning. In the other half of the draw, Iulian Chirita was the only Romanian out of four quarterfinalists to advance to the Semifinals with his 4-1 win over Eduard Ionescu. Chirita will face Germany’s Andre Bertelsmeier in the Semifinals. Bertelsmeier is the event’s second seed – the 19-year-old finished third a year ago
The U21 Women’s Singles features two Romanians through to the Semifinals. Iona Singeorzan emerged from the top half of the draw by upsetting top seeded Nina Guo Zheng of France 4-3 (including a 14-12 thriller in the seventh game). She’ll face Welsh superstar Anna Hursey, who is only 18 years old but has already won a WTT tour event. In the bottom half of the draw it will be Romania’s Elena Zaharia versus Veronika Matiunina of Ukraine – the second and third seed.
Matches will commence on Sunday morning. For full results and match highlights, visit the ETTU official site.
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