Truls Möregårdh is currently playing in the Europa Top 16, where Europe's highest ranked players meet.
At the same time, he also has something else to think about, according to Skånska Dagbladet.
The newspaper writes that the double Olympic silver medalist from last summer is in the middle of a bitter conflict with the Swedish Table Tennis Association (SBTF), and that the national team captain, Tobias Bergman, is therefore not coaching the 23-year-old. Instead, his father, Carl Möregårdh, is coaching in Montreaux.
The conflict is based on sponsorship agreements and the coaching situation for the star.
"How can anyone be satisfied with that?"
In major tournaments and championships, the association usually sends national team captains to coach the players on site. Something Möregårdh's father Carl is critical of.
The association pays people who never see Truls in training and whose contact with him is basically just saying hello at the airport. Then they show up to the match and give some general advice. How can anyone be satisfied with that?, says Carl Möregårdh to Skånska Dagbladet and continues:
If you have a coach who has seen you play five hours a day, but is forced to have another coach at the match who has no idea… it's completely insane.
Previously, Truls had a different setup, where his brother, Malte, instead coached him.
It was financed by a personal sponsor – who has nothing to do with the association – whose logo is visible on the national team jersey.
But after last summer's Olympic success, that opportunity was taken away. The association wanted the revenue to go directly to SBTF instead.
Something that was not appreciated by Möregårdh's team, and when they refused to sign, the association allegedly threatened to drop the star from the European Championship.
Threatened before the European Championship
According to Carl Möregårdh, the association set a deadline three days before the European Championship last fall and told Truls that "if you don't sign, you won't be allowed to participate".
Daniel Ellermann, sports manager at SBTF, believes that it is the increased popularity of table tennis and the rules that have stopped the personal sponsorship opportunity.
According to the rules, we can only have a certain number of sponsors on the jerseys, and if we were to let the players keep their places, we would have to say no to sponsors, he says to Skånska Dagbladet.
TT has sought out Carl Möregårdh and Daniel Ellermann.
