Möregårdh mania in Sweden: Think like Truls

Highs and lows for Truls Möregårdh

It has been quite the bounce back for Möregårdh, who after a breakthrough year in 2021 — when he won silver at that year's World Championships in Houston as an unfancied 19-year-old outsider — found himself ranked as low as world number 26 heading into last year's Paris Olympics.

"It was a tough period," Möregardh said. "I was motivated but I was not winning a lot of matches because I was playing against really good opponents and my confidence was really down before Paris.

"The time before that tournament was so strange and maybe it also helped me in the end because with that feeling I just went in and had fun and wanted to play good table tennis. That's the thinking I want to have in every tournament now but it's very difficult to have."

However, his experience from Houston in 2021 helped shape how he approached the Paris 2024 tournament.

In Houston, the then-77th-ranked Möregårdh became the lowest-ranked player to ever reach the men's singles final at a World Championships. The Swede took what he learned then and applied it in Paris.

"I felt that it was the same situation," he explained to Olympics.com.

"It was one of my first world championships when I went to Houston. I was there as a young boy who was not even seeded and wanted to play good table tennis and have a lot of fun. And I did and I came all the way to the finals which felt like gold back then.

"To Paris I went with the same feeling: I was not having a good seeding. I was not believing in myself I could do something like that as well so I just went in and enjoyed every moment and it was a silver medal there again."

Click here to read article