Durban World Table Tennis Championships Asian qualifiers, national table tennis captain Ma Long accidentally lost, in the first event of men's singles, the current world No. 2 Ma Long against Japan's No. 148 Maharu Yoshimura, Ma Long was overturned by the opponent in the big score of 3-2 leading, especially the 7th game 3-11 was broken, and finally lost to Yoshimura Maharu 3-4, upset loss.
Why is it evaluated that Malone lost the upset? One of them is Ma Long is the first person in the history of national table tennis and world table tennis, has defended the Olympic men's singles championship, completed a double-circle Grand Slam, and is full of personal honors, while Maharu Yoshimura has never won a singles world championship, and there is a huge gap between the two sides in terms of strength and status. The second is that Malone defeated Maharu Yoshimura six times in a row before this match, and his previous record was crushing, and even Maharu Yoshimura did not win a game against Malone during this period.
But in the end, Malone lost the game without warning, which also made Maharu Yoshimura very excited, and after the game, the 29-year-old Japanese titan released a series of dynamic celebrations, and the excitement was overflowing.
In addition, the Japanese media also celebrated Yoshimura's victory, commenting that it was a great victory and emphasizing that it was a great thing to be able to defeat Mallon. In the eyes of most Japanese media, Ma Long is an insurmountable mountain of Japanese table tennis, and he once gave Ma Long the title of "Imperial Tyrannosaurus Rex", highlighting the degree of respect for Ma Long by the Japanese media. So this time Maharu Yoshimura defeated Ma Long, which made the Japanese media cheer collectively!
For Malone, losing a foreign battle is rare for him, especially to a Japanese player, but now that Malone is 34 years old, he does not need any victory to prove himself, nor will it affect his historical status because of a knockout loss, winning or losing is acceptable for Malone.
It's just that in this World Table Tennis Championships qualifier, Ma Long is still burdened with a lot of task pressure, as a veteran sent to partner with Yuan Licen after 00 in men's doubles, Chairman Liu Guoliang and Coach Wang Hao have a clear meaning, that is, they want Ma Long to bring more newcomers, so Ma Long needs to play in the men's doubles and men's singles events. In contrast, Ma Long did not play in the last Houston World Table Tennis Championships and chose to rest and adjust.
It can be seen that the 34-year-old Ma Long will have physical problems in the case of multi-front combat and it is difficult to maintain his peak form. On the other hand, Liu Guoliang also needs to reflect well, because of Ma Long's excellence, he has no head coach after winning the Olympic championship in 2016, he is training alone to become stronger, which will have a lot of impact on an athlete in the long run, although during this period Ma Long still maintained the world's top athlete status, another Olympic championship and won countless world championships, but Ma Long is a man not a god, there will always be an impact, resulting in a decline in performance.
Entering 2023, Malone does not have a major championship to compete to prove himself, because most of them have already won the championship, but as an excellent athlete with a competitive mentality, Malone will strive for every possible victory as long as he can still play and play! Do you think Malone needs a new coach? Should the 34-year-old Malone focus on table tennis?
(Lin Xiaoxiang)