Table tennis world championship 1936

Table tennis world championship
1935 ← WM 1936 → 1937
date	12-18 March 1936
venue	Prague
winner
Single (♂)	Stanislav Kolář
Single (♀)	Ruth Hughes Aarons
Double (♂)	Robert Blattner James McClure
Double (♀)	Marie Kettnerová Marie Šmídová
Doubles (mixed)	Miloslav Hamer Gertrude Kleinová
Team (♂)	Austria
Team (♀)	Czechoslovakia

The 10th table tennis world championship took place from March 12th to 18th, 1936 in Prague (Czechoslovakia) in the “Lucerne” hall.

Overview

Once again, the 14 participating men's teams were divided into two preliminary round groups. Germany again provided a men's team, also to advertise sportily in view of the upcoming Olympic Games in Berlin.

In the first round, the reigning team world champion Hungary lost sensationally 5-0 to Romania. The Hungarians looked for the cause in the tables that were supposedly freshly painted shortly beforehand. You couldn't play fast balls on the not completely dried paint. The Hungarians couldn't cope with that.

Romania came first in the group after further victories. Only the last game against Poland was lost 5-0. Aloizy "Alex" Ehrlich laid the foundation for the Polish victory : against Farkas Paneth he played back the balls completely defensively and passively with an undercut. The first rally was only over after about two hours and ten minutes; Ehrlich led 1-0 through a lucky net scooter and then won the match. ( Detailed description of this match in the article Aloizy Ehrlich ) Romania also gave the remaining games without a fight, as it was already the group first. Before that, in the team fight between France and Romania, the game Vasile Goldberger-Marin (ROM) against Michel Haguenauer (FRA) was 5: 3 for Goldberger in the fifth set after more than seven hours. Thereupon the game was stopped and decided by tossing a coin.

In the parallel group, the German team only just lost against the hosts Czechoslovakia; the crowd cheering on the home team also helped Czechoslovakia. The American players surprised the other teams with a very dangerous serve : They wore a rubber cover over their thumbs. When serving, they held the ball between thumb and forefinger and gave it a strong twist with the help of the "rubber thumb" when it dropped. This serve, which embarrassed some strong opponents, was fiercely controversial, but helped the Americans to 3rd place in the opening group.

The final was played by Romania and Austria. Here, too, the defenders dragged the individual encounters very long through passive play. After several interruptions and about twelve hours of play, Austria won 5-4 and became world champions. Hungary only took 5th place.

In the women's category, the German team and the USA came second. New winners were also seen in the individual competitions. With Stanislav Kolář from Czechoslovakia, a non-Hungarian won ahead of Alex Ehrlich for the first time after six world championships . In the women's category, the American Ruth Hughes Aarons won ahead of the German Astrid Krebsbach .

The protracted fighting called the officials on the scene: The time game was introduced in 1937. If a set lasts 15 minutes, the serving player must have scored after 12 rallies at the latest, otherwise the opponent receives the point. The height of the net has also been reduced to 15.25 cm. This amount is still valid today.

useful information

• More curious details are told about the above-described marathon match Ehrlich versus Paneth. Ehrlich switched the club from one hand to the other several times. During the rally he played another game of chess by shouting his moves to a teammate. Ten umpires were worn out; they had to be changed mainly because of neck pain.
• Alex Ehrlich was a Polish Jew. He spent four years in Auschwitz and escaped the gas chamber because the Nazis recognized him as a world-class table tennis player.
• Ruth Hughes Aarons won the women's singles. To date (2014) it is the only time that a single title has been won by the USA.
• The US did not put their top player Sol Schiff on because he had signed a contract with Parker Brothers.
• In addition to the insufficient tables, the poor schedule was also criticized. The final of the men's team competition began at 11 p.m. It was interrupted after four hours and continued the next day.

Results

competition	rank	winner
Team men	1.	Austria ( Richard Bergmann , Helmut Goebel, Hans Hartinger , Erwin Kohn , Alfred Liebster , Heinrich Nitschmann )
	2.	Romania (Marin Goldberger, Farkas Paneth , Pitu Pop, Viktor Vladone, Erwin Diamandstain)
	3.	Poland (Shimcha Finkelstein, Jeziersky, Samuel Schieff, Aloizy Ehrlich , W. Loewenhertz, Simon Pohoryles)
	3.	Czechoslovakia ( Stanislav Kolář , Václav Tereba , Bohumil Váňa , Miloslav Hamer )
	5.	Hungary ( Miklós Szabados , László Bellák , Tibor Házi , István Kelen , Victor Barna )
	11.	Germany ( Helmut Ulrich , Erich Deisler , Dieter Mauritz , Georg Kutz )
Team women	1.	Czechoslovakia ( Marie Kettnerová , Gertrude Kleinová , Marie Šmídová -Masáková, Věra Votrubcová )
	2.	Germany ( Anita Felguth , Astrid Krebsbach , Hilde Bussmann , Annemarie Schulz )
	3.	USA (Corinne Migneco, Jessie Purves, Ruth Hughes Aarons )
	4th	Austria ( Gertrude Pritzi , Von Benes, Gertrude Wildam )
Men's singles	1.	Stanislav Kolář - TCH
	2.	Aloizy Ehrlich - POL
	3.	Richard Bergmann - AUT
	3.	Ferenc Soós - HUN
Ladies singles	1.	Ruth Hughes Aarons - USA
	2.	Astrid Krebsbach - GER
	3.	Marie Kettnerová - TCH
	3.	Marie Šmídová -Masáková - TCH
Men's doubles	1.	Robert Blattner / James McClure - USA
	2.	Stanislav Kolář / J. October Petricek - TCH
	3.	Tibor Házi / Ferenc Soós - HUN
	3.	Adolf Slar / Karel Fleischner - TCH
Ladies doubles	1.	Marie Kettnerová / Marie Šmídová -Masáková - TCH
	2.	Vlasta Depetrisová / Věra Votrubcová - TCH
	3.	Ruth Hughes Aarons / Jessie Purves - USA
	3.	Magda Gál / Mária Mednyánszky - HUN
Mixed	1.	Miloslav Hamer / Gertrude Kleinová - TCH
	2.	István Kelen / Mária Mednyánszky - HUN
	3.	Stanislav Kolář / Marie Šmídová -Masáková - TCH
	3.	Helmut Ulrich / Annemarie Schulz - GER

Medal table

rank	country	gold	silver	bronze	total
1	Czechoslovakia	4th	2	5	11
2	United States	2	0	2	4th
3	Austria	1	0	1	2
4th	German Empire	0	2	1	3
5	Hungary	0	1	3	4th
6th	Poland	0	1	1	2
7th	Romania	0	1	0	1
Total		7th	7th	13	27

Web links

• Entry in ITTF database (accessed March 26, 2020)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} magazine DTS , 1974/13 p. 17
2. ↑ Table Tennis Official Magazine of the ETTA , April 1936, page 4 (accessed on July 21, 2014)
3. ↑ ^{a b} Often - also in the ITTF database - the name is given as "Hamr". In Czech sources, however, the spelling “Hamer” can be found: film database , ping-pong
4. ↑ http://www.tt-wm.de/1936/wm1936_mt.html (accessed on July 29, 2010) - the ITTF archive ranks Hungary in third place