On March 23, Beijing time, the latest edition of the International Table Tennis Federation world rankings, 59-year-old Ni Xialian and partner Nutt soared from sixth to third, creating the best history of the duo. Can you imagine? The 59-year-old "grandma" is ranked second only to Sun Yingsha / Wang Manyu and Ito Mimachi / Hina Hayata. For this reason, Ni Xialian was also very excited, writing that she had become younger.
Ni Xialian is currently the oldest athlete active in the table tennis world, as a national treasure of Luxembourg sports, born in Shanghai in 1963, as early as the 1970s was selected for the Chinese national team, and also achieved good results in the world championship. After that, Ni Xialian went to Europe, became a Luxembourg citizen, began to represent Luxembourg in the competition, and has continued to do so until now.
Ni Xialian is one of Cao Yanhua's group of national table tennis players, those who played at that time, many of them are now approaching or retired in their new positions, but Ni Xialian actually insisted on being in the first-line arena, and even had an excellent competitive state, which was amazing. Ni Xialian didn't run much, almost only standing in front of the table to play, but still strong.
Last year's Tokyo Olympic Games, Ni Xialian still qualified for the competition, becoming the oldest player, and then Ni Xialian began the journey of the Paris cycle, which is even more incredible, she defeated the national table tennis player Wang Yidi 3-2 at the New Mesto Station last year, which simply refreshed the outside world's cognition of the age of table tennis players. Later, Ni Xialian also won the bronze medal in the doubles of the World Table Tennis Championships with Nat. Previously, Ni Xialian partnered with Nat to reach the quarter-finals of a Grand Slam.
As a result, in the world rankings, Ni Xialian and her partner Nat rose 6 places to the third place in the world! To this end, Ni Xialian wrote: "Unbelievable, the doubles world ranking is in the top three, I have become younger and ready to take on more challenges! ”