The highlight of the 2022 table tennis world, the WTT Grand Slam, is about to kick off in March, followed by the Chengdu Team World Table Tennis Championships in April, and recently masters around the world have also made some new moves. On February 16, Singapore's two world champions of women's table tennis, Feng Tianwei and Yu Mengyu, officially decided to withdraw from the Southeast Asian Games to be held in May.
Although the reason for the withdrawal is not clear, Feng Tianwei is not surprised to give more training and rest time to the later Grand Slam and World Table Tennis Championships, while Yu Mengyu is unknown. But what is certain is that if they register for the Southeast Asian Games, they will have some "dimensionality reduction" and bullying taste, after all, the opponent strength of this event is too poor, do not participate!
Founded in 1959, the Southeast Asian Games is a regional sports feast with a certain influence. However, as we all know, the level of sports in Southeast Asia is generally not particularly high, so it is understandable that it is not taken seriously, especially for masters such as Feng Tianwei and Yu Mengyu.
Feng Tianwei is more familiar to everyone, the dazzling star at the 2010 Moscow World Table Tennis Championships, one person broke through the Chinese team's two lines of defense in a row, defeated Ding Ning and Liu Shiwen to score 2 points, and finally helped the Singapore team to reach the top to win the championship, while Yu Mengyu was playing soy sauce at the time, failed to appear in the women's team final, which was a gold medal.
However, by the time of the 2021 Tokyo Olympic Games, Yu Mengyu's performance was more outstanding than Feng Tianwei,all the way through the barrier to eliminate world champion Ishikawa Yoshinori and others to advance to the semifinals, although he lost to Chen Meng and Ito Mimachi in succession, but the fourth place result was enough to stand out from other players in the association.
As far as table tennis is concerned, the Singapore women's team that once overpowered the national table tennis team is a standout in Southeast Asia, and it is indeed not too challenging for Feng Tianwei and Yu Mengyu to play in the games in the region, so their withdrawal from the competition not only gives others the opportunity to show, but also allows them to concentrate on preparing for more important competitions.
I have to say, time flies so fast! Feng Tianwei was only 23 years old when she competed at the Moscow World Table Tennis Championships, but now she is a 35-year-old veteran, and Yu Mengyu is also 32 years old. Among the 5 main players of national table tennis who appeared with them at the award ceremony, only Liu Shiwen has not retired, and the other 4 (Guo Yan, Guo Yue, Li Xiaoxia, Ding Ning) have bid farewell to the field.
As for Feng Tianwei and Yu Mengyu, their current competitive situation is also different - the former is a big competition, the latter is selectively participating: according to the latest news, Yu Mengyu also gave up the WTT Grand Slam, and has not competed in the World Table Tennis Championships in the past three years, so will she appear in this year's team World Table Tennis Championships? Let's wait and see!