People will encounter many opportunities in their lives, but there are very few that are enough to change the general direction of their destiny.
Unfortunately, many people may not understand this until much later, when they look back.
In May 2021, the result of a match within the Chinese table tennis team pushed Liu Guoliang and the entire national table tennis coaching team to the cusp of public opinion.
In the "Straight to WTT Grand Slam World Table Tennis Championships" and Olympic Simulation Tournament held in Xinxiang, Henan, Zhou Qihao, a non-main athlete of the men's team, won the men's singles crown in a row and won the men's singles crown. According to the regulations, the athlete with the highest number of points in the express race will be directly selected for the 2021 Houston World Table Tennis Championships, so fans can't help but cheer for Zhou Qihao:
Ranked 122nd in the world, he can achieve such achievements (at that time, Liang Jingkun ranked 10th in the world, Ma Long ranked 2nd in the world, and Fan Zhendong ranked 1st in the world), which is really a realistic version of the "Di Si Counterattack", which is so inspiring!
However, the competition on May 7 has just ended, and four days later, the national table tennis announced an important news, that is, the second through race will be held soon! Therefore, according to the regulations, Zhou Qihao must win the first place in the total points in the two competitions before and after to be selected for the World Table Tennis Championships, and it is not enough to win the championship in Xinxiang alone.
For a time, public opinion was in an uproar, because before the national table tennis never said to hold two competitions, and now Zhou Qihao just won the championship and came up with a second event, how to look a bit like "bullying people", too unfair!
Especially when people think back to what happened to Zhou Qihao a year ago, the sympathy is even more overflowing, and it is also a story about the straight-through race.
Born in 1997, Zhou Qihao and Fan Zhendong are the same batch of athletes, because of rough technology, single tactics and not taken seriously, foreign combat results are even more miserable, so for a long time everyone regarded as a "senior sparring" in the team, not many people expect him to have a big show.
However, when the 2020 National Table Tennis Direct Competition, Zhou Qihao blasted out jaw-dropping results, when he defeated two Olympic champions Ma Long and Xu Xin, showing a strong competitiveness, but unfortunately the last level was won by Fan Zhendong, which did not have the opportunity to get tickets to the Busan World Table Tennis Championships.
Three days of farewell, when the eyes are impressed.
Although Zhou Qihao was unknown before, progress always has to have a process, and he is naturally no exception: who can eat a bite into a fat man? Most of the table tennis players' golden playing age is in 23 to 27 years old, which is the most perfect combination of technology, experience and psychology, so Zhou Qihao's performance is a normal fire, as long as you can give more opportunities, the future is immeasurable!
However, as we all know, due to the impact of the outbreak of the epidemic, most of the world table tennis events have been urgently called off, so Zhou Qihao has not been given much opportunity to prove himself, and his career has continued to fall into silence. The only consolation is that because the Busan World Table Tennis Championships were also cancelled, his defeat in the pass-through does not seem to have left himself with anything to lose:
Anyway, everyone can't go.
In the 2022 Xinxiang Pass Competition, Zhou Qihao staged the return of the king and became the most beautiful boy in the whole field - last time he defeated two main players, this time it was three consecutive rounds, including the successful "revenge" Fan Zhendong to the top, winning the heart!
However, with the "change" of the national table tennis plan, Zhou Qihao had to fight for his first World Series qualification again, which was really unlucky!
How to say it, the national table tennis originally did not clearly state that it would only hold one game, so the statement of "going against the grain" was indeed untenable. However, just as the so-called one drum, and then decline, three and exhausted, Zhou Qihao did not create a miracle again after all, losing to Wang Chuqin after 00 in the Nanyang Direct Race, and finally failed to qualify for the Houston World Table Tennis Championships as the first in the total points.
In this way, Zhou Qihao lost the direct quota that was close at hand, some people felt sorry for him, some people were uneven for him, and some people could not help but sigh: only the life of sparring, can not be forced!
But facts have proved that Liu Guoliang still cherishes talent.
On October 25, 2021, the Chinese table tennis team officially announced the list of the Houston World Table Tennis Championships, which surprised countless fans that Zhou Qihao not only made the list, but also qualified for the men's singles competition!
Although the coaching staff did not make any promises to him, Zhou Qihao still carp jumped the dragon gate and became one of the top five singles main players of the Chinese table tennis men's team, which was really fantastic!
But then everyone felt something was wrong:
The men's team alone has more than five world champions, and now Zhou Qihao, who is not a world champion, occupies a place, so who is squeezed out by him?
Let's take a look at the lineup:
It is understandable that Fan Zhendong, Liang Jingkun, Wang Chuqin, and Lin Gaoyuan were selected in the year of the fight.
Veteran Xu Xin gave up the competition, it is not particularly strange, after all, he did not have a singles advantage as early as the 2019 World Table Tennis Championships, when he was the only athlete in the whole team to lose the foreign war, even if he did not take the initiative to give up this time, the probability can only play doubles, as for singles, it can be on, can not be, change the younger players are normal.
What people never expected was that Malone actually chose not to participate!
Yes, if you want to say that the most unexpected platoon of the Chinese table tennis team in the 21st century is one of them, the Houston World Table Tennis Championships without Malone is definitely one of them. You know, in 2019, Ma Long just achieved the World Table Tennis Championships men's singles triple crown, men's doubles to the top, 2021 Tokyo Olympic Games he defeated Fan Zhendong and others to win two gold medals in men's singles and men's team.
When the Houston World Table Tennis Championships roster was released, it was only more than two months after the end of the Tokyo Olympics.
But Malone just didn't participate, and gave up all the events in one go, from a table tennis overlord who made all opponents daunted, completely turned into a spectator, which made people call it incredible.
If Malone chooses to play in the Houston World Table Tennis Championships, Zhou Qihao has no chance of being selected at all - what does he compare with Malone? Just because the pass-through game won the other side?
I'm sorry, in the eyes of the national table tennis coaching staff, the civil war is played well, and the foreign war is not passed in vain. Who is Malone? The table tennis player who has won the most world championship titles in history has repeatedly won glory for the country in foreign wars, and has beaten strong opponents such as Ochalov to the point of near autism.
And Zhou Qihao?
Don't look at his direct access to the mighty eight sides, but once he arrives at the Open, he will pass all kinds of "one round of travel", qualifiers, and have never had any chances of world competitions before, and he also wants to compete with Malone for tickets to the World Table Tennis Championships? It is no exaggeration to say that this is nothing less than a fool's dream!
Obviously, without Liu Guoliang's trust and Ma Long's fulfillment, Zhou Qihao would not have been able to obtain the same status as Fan Zhendong, Liang Jingkun, Wang Chuqin and Lin Gaoyuan in 2021 to impact the men's singles gold medal at the World Championships.
As it turned out, he was disappointing.
In the Battle of the Houston World Table Tennis Championships, Zhou Qihao, as the chinese team's athlete who defended the lower half of the men's singles, lost in the second round to the German world champion Bohr (who was 41 years old) who was sixteen years older than himself - for this game, fans have different evaluations of Zhou Qihao, which is roughly divided into "sympathy" and "criticism":
Some people believe that Bohr was originally a world champion athlete, and he had defeated several generations of world champions in national table tennis (Kong Linghui, Wang Liqin, Ma Lin, Liu Guozheng, Wang Hao, Chen Xuan, Hao Shuai, Zhang Jike, Ma Long, Xu Xin, Lin Gaoyuan, Yu Ziyang), and Zhou Qihao's defeat to him was not shameful, it can only be said that his luck was too bad and sympathetic.
And another part of the people believe that Zhou Qihao's loss to Pol is not bad luck, on the contrary, it is "good luck", with his level of foreign war, let alone playIng Boer, casually encountering an unknown athlete from a foreign association can lose a mess, and this time it is not so embarrassing to lose at the hands of the world champion.
Although the latter's words sound a bit harsh, we have to admit that Zhou Qihao's foreign war achievements are indeed not good.
Among other things, half a month before the Start of the World Table Tennis Championships in Houston, he competed in two consecutive WTT Slovenia tournaments, losing once to Slovenian Dako and once to Belgian Olaf.
After all, Dako is an athlete who was able to eliminate Zhang Benzhihe at the Olympic Games and later won the European Championship singles championship, but he is also a fierce opponent; But this Olaf was only 19 years old, the world ranking was only 385 at the time, and as a result, Zhou Qihao had not played, and he still wanted to beat Pol on this performance. It is indeed unrealistic.
Before the ass was hot, Zhou Qihao lost the hard-won position of the main force of national table tennis, so the question came: Will he have the next chance?
In the early years, a table tennis team could send more than 7 athletes, or even more than a dozen athletes (more than 30 at most) to register for the men's or women's singles events of the World Championships, but as the International Table Tennis Federation continued to limit the number of participants, it is now as strong as the Chinese team, and can only have 5 people at most (the host can add 1 person).
As we all know, the men's and women's team competitions of the World Table Tennis Championships are also played by 5 people, so the two lists basically coincide. With the strength of the Chinese team, almost all the athletes who can participate in the team competition can become world champions, so it is most appropriate for them to play in singles.
And then again, the athletes who can be selected for the team competition and win the world championship title are originally the dragons and phoenixes among the people, even if everyone competes with real knives and guns, the last laugh is basically one of them - the results of the direct race in recent years can prove this.
But Zhou Qihao, with his own mentality of not being afraid and not afraid that day, pulled down three world champions in a row and finally won the men's singles championship of the Xinxiang Direct Pass, which is indeed a rare existence in the history of national table tennis, no wonder Liu Guoliang and the coaching team still decided to give him the precious singles ticket to the World Table Tennis Championships.
However, Zhou Qihao failed to live up to everyone's expectations, did not seize the opportunity, and planted.
After the arrival of 2022, with the rise of "post-03" and "post-05" young players such as Xiang Peng and Lin Shidong, Zhou Qihao's position in the team continued to decline, and the once proud civil war ability was also declining significantly, so even if he played the straight-through tournament again, he might not be able to have such good results as before.
Is it necessary to give up because of this?
Although Zhou Qihao is no longer a young general, he is only 25 years old after all, at least he is not a veteran. And since you have experienced glory and troughs, then please continue to calm your mind, re-climb the peak of table tennis, let us see the big dark horse that does not succumb to fate shine again: come on!