Athlete of the Week on RRI – Table tennis player Bernadette Szocs
Bernadette Szocs is one of the best-ranked Romanian table tennis players right now
Florin Orban, 27.11.2018, 13:15
Romanian table
tennis player Bernadette Szocs was nominated by the International Table Tennis
Federation for the Breakthrough Star Award, bestowed onto the rising star
player of the year. Other nominees include Manika Batra of India, gold medalist
at this year’s Commonwealth Games and Asian Games and South Korea’s Jang
Woojin, three time medalist at the Korean Open, in the singles, doubles and
mixed doubles events. The winner will be awarded as part of the 2018 ITTF
Awards Gala, to be held on December 12 in Incheon, South Korea.
This year
Bernadette Szocs won the European Top 16 Cup, a competition devoted to the best
European players. In 2018 she improved her world ranking significantly,
becoming the all-time best-ranked Romanian player, outranking Elizabeta Samara,
Agerpres news agency reports.
For her
nomination for the Breakthrough Star Award, we have designated Bernadette Szocs
Athlete of the Week on RRI.
Bernadette Szocs
was born on March 5, 1995 in Targu Mures, central Romania. She took up sports
at the age of 8. She grabbed her first notable results rather quick. She won
several medals in European and world tournaments and quickly climbed the
rankings. In 2010, due to the lack of financial support from the Romanian Table
Tennis Federation, Bernadette Szocs wanted to move to Norway and compete for
that country, but her plan didn’t go through. In 2016, at the European
Championships in Budapest, she won 3rd place in the mixed doubles
alongside Ovidiu Ionescu. In 2017, at the European Championships in Luxembourg,
she won the gold medal with Romania’s team, together with Elizabeta Samara and
Daniela Dodean-Monteiro.
