With the announcement of the latest world rankings for the 14th week by the International Table Tennis Federation on April 5, the national table tennis Asian Games lineup has basically determined several people in advance. According to the Asian Games selection method released by the Chinese Table Tennis Association on March 7, the men's and women's singles champions of Singapore Grand Slam events can get a singles place, and the world's highest-ranked male and female athletes in week 14 can also get a singles place. If the Grand Slam singles champion and the world's highest-ranked athlete are the same, they can be postponed. So under this rule, Singapore Grand Slam men's and women's singles champion Fan Zhendong Chen Meng and world number two Marlon Sun Yingsha won the singles quota at the Asian Games in September.
This news can be described as a few joys and a few sorrows. It is definitely good news for fans who like Chen Mengsun Yingsha Fan Zhendong and Ma Long. However, for fans who like Wang Manyu, it feels a little uncomfortable. Is it really fair for Manyu fans to suggest this? As the women's singles champion of the New York National Games and the women's singles champion of the New York World Championships, as well as the defending champion of the Asian Games, she cannot participate in singles, which is indeed a bit cruel. After all, Manyu's singles and doubles strength is very good, just because of the 3-4 defeat to Chen Meng in the women's singles final of the Grand Slam event, he lost his singles qualification?
Some fans even say that the grand slam event has four stops a year, and the singles quota of the Asian Games is determined by the results of only one stop, and there are still five months before the Asian Games.
After the fans said this, they suddenly found that compared with Sun Yingsha Xiao Sasha, Manyu did have less luck. Compared with last year, on the eve of the Tokyo Olympic Games, she defeated Chen Meng in the team's simulation competition but could only qualify for the P card. This year, she defeated Sun Yingsha in the semi-finals of the Grand Slam tournament but could only qualify for the women's team, feeling that Manyu was always half a beat slower.
If Manyu can beat Sun Yingsha in the team competition in 2019 and 2020, he may be able to qualify for singles. But Sun Yingsha did do do better in 2019, she won the Japan Open, the Australian Open and the German Open and the Asian Championship women's singles title, while Manyu only had the Qatar Open women's singles championship in 2019. Or if he defeats Chen Meng in this Singapore Grand Slam tournament to win the championship, Manyu can also get a singles spot.
So maybe it's not that Manyu is not good, it's that the selection rules have a time limit and are not perfect, for example, if the selection rules stipulate that the next male and female singles champions will qualify for singles? After all, there are still more than 5 months before the Asian Games, and the Singles Quota for the Tokyo Olympics was announced two months in advance, do you think it is fair for Manyu to not have a chance to singles?