2012 London to London

of Austria was the only mainly defensive
player to reach the later stages.
There were two groups of eight men’s
teams in the Swaythling Cup competition.
In group one, Austria lost only to
England, England lost only to the U.S.A.
and the U.S.A. lost only to Austria. Poland,
which had been considered one of
the strongest teams in the group, lost to
Austria, the U.S.A. and, for the first time,
to England. Therefore, the end result
was a triple tie and a play-off was organised
to decide the final group positions.
Austria and the U.S.A. easily beat England,
while Austria defeated the U.S.A.
five-three to become the group winners.
The replay of the match between Austria
and the U.S.A. produced some spectacular
table tennis. In his match against
Sol Schiff, Bergmann won the first game
22-20 and lost the second 18-21. In the
third game Schiff, one of the hardest hitters
in the world, kept up the attack but
Bergmann seemed to be able to retrieve
the ball from any angle and in the end
it was Schiff who weakened, losing 7-21.
The result of group two was much more
clear-cut, with Hungary winning all of
their matches, although they had some
anxious moments against both Czechoslovakia
and France. The final was held
in the Royal Albert Hall on Monday 31st
January, when Hungary beat Austria
to regain the title they had last held
in 1935. The women’s team winners
were Czechoslovakia, who won all of
their matches, seven of them without
losing an individual match. Their only
close matches were against Austria
and Hungary, where the scores were
three-one and three-two respectively.
London, the Home of Table Tennis
Photo: ITTF Archives
Vana Bohumil
The men’s singles finalists were Bergmann
of Austria and Bohumil Vana of
Czechoslovakia. In the first game they
seemed evenly matched, with first one
then the other taking the lead and
Bergmann eventually winning 22-20.
However, in the second Vana completely
changed his game and went
on all-out attack, leaping about the
playing area to ensure being in the
best position for his powerful forehand
hit. Bergmann was taken by surprise
and, in spite of some spectacular
retrieving, he lost the game 9-21.
In the next two games Vana continued
to attack, albeit more cautiously. He won
both to gain his first world title. It was
suggested afterwards that Bergmann
had made a mistake in keeping to defensive
play rather than making use of
his own attacking capability but perhaps
Vana’s extraordinary speed and agility
did not give him the opportunity to do so.
London to London 41