Will Waldheim tennis oldies achieve their greatest triumph?

Forest home. This weekend the time has come. The men’s team 65 of the 1. TC Waldheim will play for the German championship in their age group.

The prerequisite for this was the confident performance of the team from Zschopau in the Regionalliga Südost, which was rewarded with the series victory, the only one by a non-Bavarian team in all eleven series of the various age groups and the first ever by a Saxon team.

This means that the team led by captain Ernst Schneider has qualified to play directly for the German championship in the Final Four with the three champions of the other regional leagues Southwest, West and Northeast.

High-class opposition

The matches will be played on the premises of last year’s champion TC Raadt, a tennis club from Mülheim an der Ruhr.

In addition to Waldheim, Raadt, the current West champion, the champion from the Southwest, TC Tennis 65 Eschborn, and the runner-up from the West, TC Rot-Weiß Hangelar from St. Augustin, will be taking part in the tournament. The champion of the Northwest division decided not to take part.

“It should be a high-class event, as all teams will be fielding top German players and plenty of foreign celebrities, all of whom occupy the top spots in the world rankings,” says Ernst Schneider, who rates the quality of the field of starters as extremely high.

A German favorite is the Eschborn team around the German serial champion Norbert Henn, who is currently number two in the individual world rankings in the 65 age group.

All other teams, including 1.TC Waldheim, are roughly equally strong. “So we’ll need a bit of luck in the draw and in the match,” says Ernst Schneider, adding: “It will also be interesting to see how the players cope with the expected temperatures.”

The two matches of the first match day on Sunday evening will be determined by seeding the two strongest teams and drawing lots for the other two teams.

Luck is required

Normally, this is done according to the positions in the rankings or according to performance classes. However, these often give a distorted picture, as some top players do not participate in ranking tournaments or do not participate regularly and therefore do not appear in the rankings or appear further down.

“If the captains cannot agree on a seeding, which is likely to happen, a direct draw will be held,” explains Ernst Schneider. The two winners of the first day will play for the German championship title on Sunday, and the losers will play in the small final for third place.

For the Zschopau team, it’s all about avoiding title favorite Eschborn as much as possible at the start. According to Ernst Schneider, the Waldheim team’s desired goal is of course a medal. “That would be the greatest triumph in the club’s history,” says the club boss and TCW captain.

Waldheimer with strongest squad

In order to achieve this, the strongest Waldheim squad will travel to the Ruhr area on Friday. The numbers one to ten will be: Miguel Mir Rodon, Michal Kuchar, Narcis Carbo, Ernst Schneider, Ramon Canosa-Sendra, Jiri Mares, Cuan Neethling, Andreas Naumann, Tilo Wutzler and Andreas Becher.

The team is receiving support on site from a whole host of fans who are travelling with them and who, like the entire Saxon Tennis Association and of course the players themselves, hope that the team will be on the podium for the awards ceremony on Sunday.