Table tennis player Ryu to play in German pro league

Ryu Seung-min, a member of South Korea's silver medal-winning table tennis team at the London Olympics, will ply his trade in Germany starting this month.

In an interview Thursday with news Y, Yonhap News Agency's all-news cable channel, Ryu said he has signed a one-year loan deal with TTF Ochsenhausen in Bundesliga, the top division table tennis league in Germany.

Ryu said the deal starts on Aug. 26, the opening day of the 2012-2013 season, and the season will end in June next year.

TTF Ochsenhausen has won Bundesliga championships in 1997, 2000 and 2004. The league was founded in 1933.

In South Korea, which doesn't have a professional table tennis league, Ryu competes for an industrial league team.

"I will only come back home for the national championships at the end of the year, and will focus on Germany for the time being," Ryu said. "The club wants a two-year deal, and so it's possible I may extend the deal by another year."

Ryu, 30, was one of three members of the South Korean men's team that lost to China in the team gold medal match at the London Olympics earlier this month. Ryu won the men's singles gold medal at the 2004 Athens Olympics and then the team bronze medal four years later in Beijing.

This will be Ryu's fourth stint in Europe. As a high school player, he spent five months with Borussia Dusseldorf on a loan in 2000. He's also played for SVS in Austria in 2005 and GVH in 2008.

"TTF Ochsenhausen is one of the storied franchises in Germany, which is home to perhaps the world's most active professional league," Ryu said. "If I can learn from their advanced system, I think it will help me a great deal not just as a player but as a coach down the road."

Following their defeat to China in London, Ryu and his South Korean teammates, Oh Sang-eun and Joo Sae-hyouk, all spoke of the need to start a professional league in South Korea and develop younger players to better challenge China's stranglehold in international ping pong. (Yonhap)