Original document in MS-Word 97

Interpretation of ITTC-regulations

Copenhagen July 19^th 1998.

To organisers of Table Tennis Tournaments under the Regulations of the ITTC.

There seems to be some confusion about the interpretation of the ITTC-regulations describing the organisation of tournaments of the different ranking value.

The ITTC-regulations describes very clear that for tournament with the ranking factor 30, 50, 80 there is a limitation of the number of players from each country participating in an event.

The ITTC-regulations do neither describe playing system nor restrictions for tournaments with ranking factor 20 or 10.

The interpretation of the ITTC-regulations made by the ITTC-rules Officer is that the organisers of tournaments with ranking factor 20 or 10 has quite a lot of flexibility. They can try new playing systems i.e. mixed-teams, combined teams from two countries, accepting more than 3 players from the same country in an event and a lot of other things to try to develop the sport of disabled table tennis.

At the nations meeting during the World Championships in France the Committee will propose a change of the regulations to clarify this to avoid any confusion in the future.

The Committee has already received some indications from several countries which shows that it is necessary to have some category of tournaments where players who not necessary are among the best in a country can participate to earn points for the World Ranking.
With the current regulations this is possible to do that in tournaments with ranking factor 10 or 20.

The committee would like to hear the opinions of the nations at the meeting in France on this subject and make a clarification of the regulations according to the majority of that meeting.