Seven-Game Battles in Antibes: SAMOKHIN Holds Firm, NOIRAULT Enjoys Perfection, and Two Empty Chairs Nobody Noticed

Antibes grew late that night. Table four was still lit, the ball clicking against the wooden surface loud enough to count each beat. Tiago ABIODUN stood in the left corner, gripping his blade so hard the knuckles went white. He had just lost three straight games to Yoan VELICHKOV. The scoreboard read 0-3. In youth table tennis, that number usually marks the end of a head that has not yet hardened. But ABIODUN did not let go. He clawed back one game at a time, and by the seventh game he had won. The scoreboard read 4-3. Nobody recorded his breathing after the final rally, and nobody recorded the two-second silence before VELICHKOV nodded to the net. I sat in the third row, a notebook already filled to three pages, and asked myself: is this courage, or simply the byproduct of two incomplete technical machines facing each other across the table?

Earlier that same day, in another corner of the hall, another player also recovered from 1-3 down to win 4-3. Then another. Then another. Four reverse-sweeps in a single day of play. That number is not random. It is a signal. And for someone who has spent nine years watching youth academies, that signal deserves more than a results wire.

The Event and the Frame We Need

The Europe Youth Top 10 (U19 Boys) is a closed event run by the European Table Tennis Union in Antibes, France. It is not a fixture on the senior WTT points ladder. It does not generate ranking points for young players the way a Grand Smash or a Star Contender does. Its value, in other words, is not on the scoreboard but somewhere else: it is where European national associations bring their best U19 players to face peers at the same developmental stage, to measure themselves.

The format is a single round-robin. Every match is best-of-seven. With a field of only ten players, that means each athlete plays multiple matches in a single day, and each match can stretch to a seventh game. This is the detail I want to hold onto when reading results: seven games is not just a technical figure, it is a test of fitness and nerve, especially when you must walk into three, four, five such matches in one session.

The associations represented span widely: Russia, France, Bulgaria, Portugal, Poland, Slovakia, Romania. Seven nations, ten players. No China, no Japan, no Korea. This is a purely European arena, and that matters when we ask about the bigger picture: we are looking at a distinct stratum of European table tennis, not at the global balance of power.

The event photographer was Anthoine BERTHELEMY. That small detail — a French photographer, in a French city, for an event with three French players in the draw — suggests the French federation had a significant organising role. It does not falsify the results, but it reminds me of an old rule: when reading any report, note where the writer is standing.

The Numbers That Speak

Let us begin with what the scoreboard says.

Aleksei SAMOKHIN (Russia) beat VELICHKOV 4-2. He then beat ABIODUN 4-3, a match in which he trailed 2-3 at one stage and had to come back. By the end of the day, SAMOKHIN was unbeaten. He is the clear pace-setter of the event, at least in what was reported.

Antoine NOIRAULT (France) had an almost perfect Saturday: beat ARPAS 4-1, beat BLASZCZYK 4-1, and beat VELICHKOV 4-3 after trailing 1-3. Three matches, three wins. Two of them were dominant on the scoreboard, one was a comeback.

Nathan PILARD (France) won two matches, both 4-1, over ARPAS and BLASZCZYK. These are the most dominant scorelines in the reported set.

Tiago ABIODUN (Portugal) had a remarkable day: beat BLASZCZYK 4-2 and beat VELICHKOV 4-3 after trailing 0-3. A comeback from the floor.

Samuel ARPAS (Slovakia) lost to NOIRAULT and PILARD, but closed the day with a 4-3 win over MOURIER after trailing 1-3.

Yoan VELICHKOV (Bulgaria) had perhaps the toughest day in the reported set: lost to SAMOKHIN, lost to ABIODUN, lost to NOIRAULT. Three defeats, two of them in seven-game matches he had once led.

Marcel BLASZCZYK (Poland) lost three reported matches, to ABIODUN, NOIRAULT and PILARD. Flavio MOURIER (France) has only one reported result: a 3-4 loss to ARPAS.

And finally, two names that did not appear on the scoreboard in the usual way: Patryk ZYWORONEK (Poland) and Robert ISTRATE (Romania) withdrew through injury.

That is everything the scoreboard offers. And as always, the scoreboard does not tell the whole story.

People Look at the Scoreboard; I Look at Worn Shoes and Eyes Still Holding Fire

The most striking thing about Antibes is not who beat whom. It is the frequency of seventh games.

Of the ten reported matches, at least six went to a deciding game. Four of those were comebacks from a losing position. If this were a senior event, I would read that number as a sign of parity at the top. But this is U19. And at U19, a match that stretches to a seventh game usually speaks not of parity but of instability.

Think about it technically. A U19 player is still finishing his basic strokes. He may have an excellent backhand but an unsteady forehand. He may have a tricky serve but weak reading of the opponent's serve. Against an opponent of similar level, those gaps surface game by game. One game he wins 11-6 because the opponent errs. The next he loses 11-8 because he errs himself. The result is a seven-game match that nobody truly controls.

This does not mean these players lack talent. It means they are exactly where their development stage says they should be. And it raises a question I keep returning to when watching youth table tennis: are we training winners, or are we training complete players?

Four Comebacks and the Question of Nerve

Look at the four reverse-sweeps.

SAMOKHIN recovered from 2-3 to beat ABIODUN 4-3. ABIODUN recovered from 0-3 to beat VELICHKOV 4-3. NOIRAULT recovered from 1-3 to beat VELICHKOV 4-3. ARPAS recovered from 1-3 to beat MOURIER 4-3.

Four different players. Four different opponents. One pattern. If I only read the scoreboard, I would write a conclusion about the nerve of European youth. But I have sat long enough at youth events to know things are more complicated.

First, look at the player being reversed on. VELICHKOV appears in three of those four comebacks. He led ABIODUN 3-0 and lost. He led NOIRAULT 3-1 and lost. He was level with SAMOKHIN 2-2 and lost the last two games. This is a very clear pattern: VELICHKOV can lead, but he cannot close. That could be a fitness issue, a psychological issue, a tactical issue. The scoreboard is not enough to distinguish.

But it suggests something: at U19, the ability to close a match matters more than the ability to start it. And that is a trainable skill. It is no accident that many youth academies now devote entire sessions to "pressure points" — serving while leading 10-9, handling the ball while trailing 9-10, learning to breathe between points. None of that appears on the scoreboard, yet it decides the scoreboard.

And when I look at ABIODUN — the man who recovered from 0-3 — I see a different signal. He did not merely recover the score. He recovered the mind. In table tennis, when you are down 0-3, you do not only need to win four straight games technically. You need to convince yourself it is possible. Many young players collapse in the fourth game, not because they play badly, but because they have already believed in the outcome. ABIODUN did not believe. That is a valuable signal.

VELICHKOV and the Lesson of the Biggest Loser

I want to give Yoan VELICHKOV his own section, because he is the player the scoreboard treats worst.

Looking at the results, you see a player who lost three matches. You might think he is weak. But look more closely. He lost to SAMOKHIN — unbeaten all day — 2-4, including a game he led. He lost to ABIODUN 3-4 after leading 3-0. He lost to NOIRAULT 3-4 after leading 3-1. These are not the defeats of a weak player. They are the defeats of a player whose technique is good enough to lead strong opponents, but who lacks the tools to close.

In youth table tennis there is a type of player who is very easily undervalued: the one who can create an advantage but cannot sustain it. Such players are often labelled "mentally weak". But from a development angle, they are often the ones with the best technical foundation — otherwise they could not have led in the first place. Their problem lives on another floor: match management, energy management, emotion management.

I have seen this in a specific case I tracked for years. A young athlete I observed at the Cerezo Osaka academy — not table tennis, but the principle transfers — tended to play very well in the first 60 minutes and fade in the last 30. When I analysed the data, the problem was not fitness. It was that he had no "second-half plan". He played on instinct in the first half, and when instinct ran out he had nothing to lean on. VELICHKOV may be in a similar situation: a player with the tools to create an advantage, but not yet the structure to sustain it across seven games.

If I were VELICHKOV's coach, I would not worry about these three defeats. I would worry about how long it takes him to learn to close. And I would remember that at 17 or 18, the ability to learn matters more than the result of one day.

NOIRAULT and the Perfect Day

Antoine NOIRAULT had the best day of any reported player. Three wins, two of them 4-1, one a 4-3 comeback.

What stands out about NOIRAULT is not that he won. It is how he won. The 4-1 wins over ARPAS and BLASZCZYK show a level of match control well above what we saw elsewhere. On a day when most matches stretched to a seventh game, winning two matches 4-1 is a signal of stability.

But I want to be careful here. NOIRAULT is French, playing on French soil, covered by a European outlet based in France. There is a possibility — not a certainty, but a possibility — that his wins were reported more fully than those of other players. This is not an accusation. It is a methodological note. When reading any report, I always ask: who is recorded, and who is left out?

What is certain is that, in what was recorded, NOIRAULT played very well. And in a round-robin event, winning all three of a day's matches is a notable achievement, whatever the opponents.

SAMOKHIN and the Pace-Setter's Position

Aleksei SAMOKHIN (Russia) is the clear pace-setter. Unbeaten in every reported match. Beat VELICHKOV 4-2. Beat ABIODUN 4-3 after trailing 2-3.

What stands out about SAMOKHIN is that he won in two different ways. Against VELICHKOV he controlled relatively well — 4-2, level at 2-2 then pulled away. Against ABIODUN he had to fight — trailing 2-3, then recovering. A young player who can win in different ways is a player with many tools.

But I do not want to inflate this. This is a European U19 event. SAMOKHIN may become a great player, or he may not. Youth table tennis history is full of players who dominated U19 events and vanished at senior level. And conversely, full of players who were unremarkable at U19 and became great stars. Every star was once a doubtful speck of light in a dark corner of an academy.

What I can say with moderate confidence is this: on this day, SAMOKHIN proved two things. First, he has the technique to control a match. Second, he has the nerve to come back when trailing. Both are necessary bricks for a long career. But they are only bricks, not a house.

France and the Story of Depth

Of the ten players, three were French: NOIRAULT, PILARD and MOURIER. That is a signal of the depth of the French U19 cohort.

More notable is how two of the three French players performed. NOIRAULT won two matches 4-1. PILARD won two matches 4-1. These are the most dominant scorelines in the entire reported set. If I were a neutral observer, I would record this as a signal about the technical foundation of French youth table tennis.

But again, I must be careful. There are three possible explanations for the presence of three French players. First, France genuinely has a strong U19 cohort. Second, France has more entry slots as host nation. Third, French players were reported more fully because the event took place in France. There is not enough data to distinguish these three. But I know French table tennis has made significant strides over the past decade, and the presence of three players in a "Top 10" field is a signal consistent with that trend.

For a long-term observer, this is the kind of signal worth tracking. Not because these three players will become world champions, but because they represent a system. And systems are what produce champions.

Two Empty Chairs

And then there is the part I want to spend the most time on, even though it occupies the fewest words in the source report.

Patryk ZYWORONEK (Poland) and Robert ISTRATE (Romania) withdrew through injury.

It is one short line. It is usually skipped. But it is the most important line in the entire report, at least to me.

Think about it. A "Top 10" event has only ten players. Two of them withdrew through injury. That is 20 per cent of the field. At U19 level.

And look at the schedule. Every match is best-of-seven. In a single day a player may have to play three, four, even five matches. With matches stretching to a seventh game — and we have seen at least six such matches in one day — total physical load can reach hundreds of points, thousands of steps, hundreds of rotations and jumps.

This is an issue I have tracked for years. In youth table tennis there is an invisible but powerful pressure: the pressure to play more. Tournaments are denser, flights are longer, entry slots are more competitive. Young players — whose bodies are still developing in bone, joint and muscle — are pushed into a schedule even adults would struggle to endure.

A pandemic could not bury a sapling; it only drove the roots deeper. But an injury can bury a sapling. Not immediately. But through months of rehabilitation, months of lost momentum, months during which peers move forward while you stand still.

And here is what I want to say about how we treat injured young players. There is a common pattern in sport: when an athlete returns from injury, people demand that they "prove themselves". As if injury were a moral test, and returning were an exam. This is cruel and counterproductive. It creates re-injury pressure — because the athlete feels they must go all-out immediately, must win immediately, must prove immediately, instead of being allowed to recover step by step.

I have seen this. In 2026, when a young athlete I was tracking tore a knee ligament in an empty training session, I spent the following three weeks visiting the hospital where he was being treated. I witnessed the days he said he wanted to quit sport. Not because of pain — because of fear. Fear that he would never return. Fear that people would see him as finished, at 18.

The injuries of ZYWORONEK and ISTRATE may be minor. They may return within weeks. But whether severe or light, their withdrawal is a reminder that behind every number on a scoreboard is a human body, and behind every body a human life.

On Reading a Scoreboard

I have spent many years looking at scoreboards. And I have learned one thing: a scoreboard is a tool, not an answer. It tells you who beat whom, but not why. It tells you how long a match lasted, but not what was inside a player's head.

To understand a player you need more than a scoreboard. You need to see how they walk to the table when trailing 0-3. How they wipe their face after losing a point. How they serve while leading 10-8. How they stand after losing the seventh game. None of that appears in any report.

I do not write about the match; I write about the people the match is carving.

And when I look at a day of play in Antibes, I see more than a list of results. I see a stratum. I see young players at an age where every match is a lesson, every win a brick, every defeat a scar. I see a European development system trying to produce players who can compete with the rest of the world.

And I see a question I have not yet answered: are we training players, or are we training medals?

Another Reading of the Seventh Games

I want to return to the figure of six seven-game matches, because I think it carries a lesson we often miss.

The common reading is: many seven-game matches mean the event was exciting, balanced, dramatic. That reading is not wrong. But it is only half the story.

The other reading is: many seven-game matches at U19 means many players who cannot close a match early. At elite level, top players usually win 4-0 or 4-1 against weaker opponents, and only go to a seventh game against equals. At U19, the seventh-game rate is far higher, because players do not yet have the tools to create separation.

This does not mean they are poor. It means they are at a specific stage. And that stage has its own needs.

The greatest need is: permission to err. A U19 player needs space to try new strokes, to lose because of those strokes, to learn from failure. If we judge them only by results, we will produce safe players — players who win U19 matches by playing conservatively, but never develop the tools needed to win at senior level.

This is the paradox of youth table tennis: to produce a great player, you must accept that they will lose more than necessary in the early phase.

And this paradox is threatened by a trend I have tracked for years: the physicalisation of youth events. More and more U18 and U19 tournaments emphasise fitness, speed, power. That is not wrong in principle — modern sport demands physicality. But it erodes something else: the technical soil. Young players are trained to run fast and hit hard, but not trained enough to understand the match.

I am not saying the Antibes event is an example of this trend. I do not have enough data to conclude that. But I am saying that when I look at a day of play with six seven-game matches and two injuries, I see a familiar pattern. And that pattern deserves thought.

On Those Who Do Not Appear on the Scoreboard

There is one thing every sports report omits: the people who do not appear on the scoreboard.

In this case, they are the coaches who have spent thousands of hours on court with these players. The doctors and physiotherapists who have helped them recover from every small injury. The fathers and mothers who drove them to training since they were children. The friends who stayed beside them on the days they wanted to quit.

I think about those people when I read about ABIODUN recovering from 0-3. Because a player does not naturally acquire that nerve. Nerve is built day by day, by the people around them. By sessions where a coach sets up an 0-3 scenario and demands they recover. By practice matches where they lose and must face themselves. By people who believed in them before they believed in themselves.

This is the part of sport I always want to write about, and always find hard to write. Because it has no data. No scores. No rankings. It has only people, working quietly, and sometimes seeing the result of their work in a rally nobody knows is theirs.

A Thought to Carry Forward

So what should we take from a day of play in Antibes?

Not that SAMOKHIN will become world champion. Not that NOIRAULT is the future of French table tennis. Not that France is pulling ahead in the European youth race.

But this: what we saw in Antibes is a slice of a much longer process. These players are midway through a journey of which we see a single frame. Some will continue. Some will stop. Some will become big names. Some will disappear from the table tennis map within a few years.

The only thing I can say with confidence is this: on that day, in Antibes, there were people who fought. People who recovered from 0-3. People who lost after leading 3-0. People who withdrew through injury. People who sat in the stands, took notes, and tried to understand what was happening.

And one thing is certain: the dig is not finished. Raw gems still lie in the dust of time, waiting for a light to fall on them. It could be SAMOKHIN. It could be NOIRAULT. It could be a name nobody in Antibes noticed.

In the dust of time, there are gems that only wait for a single light.

And my task — as I keep reminding myself — is to keep shining the light.