May 15, 2009
WTTC: Interview with Jun Mizutani & Seiya Kishiskawa
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Courtesy of Butterfly-World
Jun Mizutani / Seiya Kishiskawa: “An unbelievable feeling to win a WC Medal”
At the World Championships 2009 in Yokohama Jun Mizutani and Seiya Kishikawa were the only ones in the men’s event who were not from China. After the tournament the Japanese stars talked about their impressions and perspectives:
Butterfly: “It is almost impossible to win a Bronze Medal in the doubles in a more dramatic way. With 3:2 in sets and being down 8:9 in the sixth set against Gao Ning/Yang Zi the umpire made a wrong decision against you and in favour of Singapore. Discussions which lasted for minutes and clear evidence in super slow motion on the video screen in the hall could bring neither the umpire nor your opponents to correct the score. Then you turned an 8:10 into a 13:11 and the nearly 13.000 spectators celebrated your Bronze Medal…”
Mizutani: “That was not an easy situation, there was a lot of excitement. But: The umpire has the final last word. There is no way around it. When the decision remained 8:10 we were mentally completely down. But we really wanted these two points and were not allowed to give up after the tremendous support of the audience. It was an unbelievable feeling when we won the set and with that also the Bronze Medal.”
Butterfly: “What is important in such a dramatic situation?”
Mizutani and Kishikawa: “It is important to stay calm and keep your head clear despite all the inner tension. But the most important thing is that you can rely 100% on your material because each touch with the ball is deciding about victory and defeat. We are happy that we never have to worry about the quality of our material.”
Butterfly: “Did you expect to win this medal for Japan?”
Kishikawa: “You cannot plan to win a medal 100%. But playing at home it was our target to win a medal for Japan. That is the reason why we took part.”
Mizutani (adding): “Two years ago we were already in the quarterfinals in Zagreb in the doubles. Then we lost and such defeats make you more mature. We profited from that during this WC.”
Butterfly: “How do you evaluate the results of this WC where China was supreme?”
Mizutani: “We won a medal but the gap to China is still too big. We have to work hard on this. But we have a young team and are all able to develop further.”
Butterfly: “What does the future for Japanese table tennis look like?”
Kishikawa: “We must continue on our path consequently. I think we became very mature by living and training in Germany for some years. Jun has also been in Germany until one year ago and played for my next club, the Butterfly Team Borussia Duesseldorf.”
Mizutani: “I will stay in Japan where we will follow a training program especially for me and other good players. Altogether we are a young ambitious team, which will hopefully play for a lot more medals in the future.”
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