Recently, some media said that the Chinese Olympic Organizing Committee believes that the WTT World Cup champion of table tennis is not a world champion, and some say that the annual report of the General Administration of Sport of China does not include this champion in the number of champions, so it is negative. No matter which institution it is, the problem points to one, that is, the WTT World Cup title that Sun Yingsha just won is not a world champion. But before that, many media had already determined that Sun Yingsha had won the singles world championship.
This confusion was sparked only by the lack of clarity in the design and description of the ITTF and WTT events of the ITTF and the World Table Tennis Federation.
Let's sort it out briefly.
What we usually call a Grand Slam includes the Olympic Games, the World Table Tennis Championships, and the World Cup. Held in 4, 2 and 1 years, these three events are of course all events belonging to the International Table Tennis Federation. WTT is called the World Table Tennis Major League. We can take a look at the following instructions:
It aims to comprehensively upgrade and transform the event system and commercial system of the ITTF with athletes and fans as the core, give full play to the potential of table tennis, and further promote the world influence of table tennis, so as to stand out in the competition with other sports. Among them, the most high-profile idea is to set up four Grand Slam tournaments every year, WTT hopes to make it the world's top sports event comparable to the four Grand Slams of tennis and the Golf Masters. In addition to the Grand Slam, WTT will also set up a series of grand prix competitions every year to attract top athletes with generous prize money.
However, since its inception, WTT has inevitably clashed with many competitions in the past, and the original ITTF Open is now almost completely replaced by WTT events. WTT is a commercial event, but also has world ranking points. Also, the original three contests WTT also want to eat it. It is reported that at first, WTT wanted to include the World Championships in the scope of WTT events, but it was strongly resisted by the industry and finally retained. But the original annual World Cup singles were not so lucky. The 2021 Singapore World Cup Finals, the more unified statement is that the original ITTF World Cup and the Finals were cancelled and changed to the WTT World Cup Finals, which is what the WTT official media called.
Then the question is, the original World Cup belongs to the world championship, the original finals do not belong (because it is commercial), then the original World Cup cancellation and the finals merger, that is, the traditional three major competition sequences and commercial competitions, what is the nature of this mixed competition? Neither the ITTF nor the WTT has a clear explanation.
On the road to change, many things are just not clear.
The report of the Competition Department of the State General Administration of Sport, "2021 Report on the Achievements of Chinese Athletes", did not include Sun Yingsha's achievements in the world championship, and can only say that in the ambiguous and vague time, the General Administration of Sport will certainly not be entangled and hesitant, and decisively determine: No. This is also understandable. Isn't it? If it is determined to be: Yes. Then the controversy could be even greater!
However, many people are very happy about the conclusion of the General Administration of Sports! It seems that Sun Yingsha can't win the world championship, these people are particularly cool! That's really confusing! Why would an athlete who has repeatedly defeated Ito in important competitions and won glory for his country have such a mentality? Objectively speaking, Sun Yingsha's level has now ranked in the top three main forces, and she and Chen Meng and Wang Manyu have also formed a new Chinese women's team, which is the absolute three main players, and it is not surprising that such a level can take the world championship.
Here, I hope that Sun Yingsha will continue to work hard and win the world championship as soon as possible. I am convinced of the coming of this day!
The following are some of the online disputes (image format, you can click to enlarge to view):