On March 25, 2022, the Star Challenge entered the first match day, the national table tennis men's singles six people participated in the singles qualifiers, Zhou Qihao eliminated Japan's new star Yuji Tanaka 3-1, Xue Fei defeated the French player Akuzu 3-0, while adding two people to withdraw, Zeng Beixun / Liang Guodong abstained, the original two wanted to participate in the men's doubles qualifiers, and now temporarily decided to withdraw, the national table tennis currently only has Xue Fei / Zhao Zihao a pair of combinations.
Zhou Qihao is 25 years old, ranked 99th in the world, he once won the men's singles championship in the straight through competition, Fan Zhendong won the men's singles championship, the table tennis super league defeated Wang Chuqin to win the championship, is a very powerful young player, last year also won the world table tennis championship singles qualification, the second round lost to the German famous Pol, but Zhou Qihao's on-site performance is very unstable, the foreign war results are not good, so everyone calls him a nerve knife.
The national table tennis coaching team still attaches more importance to Zhou Qihao, has been giving him the opportunity, hoping that he can prove himself through the results and make a breakthrough in the international arena, but the recent performance of Zhou Qihao is relatively mediocre, and there are not too eye-catching results, but Yuan Lichen is black to the end, by the attention of outside fans, the opportunity is in front of him, everyone depends on their own ability, whether they can seize it all depends on their own efforts.
In the first round of the qualifiers, Zhou Qihao against Japanese rising star Yuji Tanaka, the latter is 21 years old, ranked 119th in the world, Tanaka Yuji has average results, often eliminated in the qualifiers, although Tanaka Yuji's men's doubles wins Zhou Qihao, but the comprehensive strength of the two has a very poor gap, Zhou Qihao as long as he plays at a normal level, wins this men's singles competition, eliminating Tanaka Yuji to advance to the next round has no problem.
After the start of the game, the first set Zhou Qihao strengthened the offensive, comprehensively suppressed Tanaka Yuji, soon blasted out 11-4 first, in the second set Zhou Qihao had some tight hands, there were too many unnecessary mistakes, Tanaka Yuji took the lead, Zhou Qihao continued to chase points at the end of the innings, but unfortunately the key points missed the opportunity, Tanaka Yuji won 11-9, zhou Qihao fell behind to 8 draws in the third set, and then scored 3 consecutive points to win 11-8.
In the fourth set, Zhou Qihao took a 4-1 lead, Tanaka Yuji chased to 6 draws, the two sides fell into a battle, the score alternately rose, Tanaka Yuji 10-9 to get the set point, Zhou Qihao defused the set point, chased 11 draws to score 2 points to win 13-11, and finally eliminated Yuji Tanaka 3-1 to advance to the second round of the men's singles qualifier, and then played against India's Shetty.
Straight board star Xue Fei won three consecutive sets 11-3, 11-8, 12-10, 3-0 victory over France's Akuzu, the next opponent is likely to be South Korea's youngster Zhao Dacheng, in addition to the men's doubles Liang Guodong / Zeng Beixun temporarily retired, the national table tennis in the doubles event, only Xue Fei / Zhao Zihao pair of combinations, three consecutive tournaments, a similar situation.