In the history of Chinese women's table tennis, so far, a total of 7 people have won the Olympic singles championship, they are Chen Jing, Deng Yaping, Wang Nan, Zhang Yining, Li Xiaoxia, Ding Ning and Chen Meng!
Among the seven athletes, Deng Yaping, Wang Nan, Zhang Yining, Li Xiaoxia and Ding Ning all achieved Grand Slams.
Chen Meng is currently aiming for a sixth Grand Slam winner.
Among the five Grand Slam athletes, Deng Yaping holds 6 singles championships in the three major competitions, Wang Nan and Zhang Yining both hold 8 singles championships in the three major competitions, Ding Ning holds 7 singles championships in the three major competitions, and Li Xiaoxia is the athlete with the fewest singles world championships, only three!
Li Xiaoxia's three major singles world champions are precisely one champion each of the Olympic Games, the World Table Tennis Championships and the World Cup!
It can be said that Li Xiaoxia is the goalkeeper of the Grand Slam, and only by catching up with Li Xiaoxia can it be possible to achieve a Grand Slam!
For Chen Meng today, the biggest goal is to catch up with Li Xiaoxia and become the sixth Grand Slam winner of Chinese women's table tennis!
And Chen Meng's last chance is actually the Durban World Table Tennis Championships two months later, if Chen Meng can seize this opportunity, she will become the sixth Grand Slam winner of Chinese women's table tennis and enter the ranks of the Grand Slam from then on!
But for Chen Meng, it is still very difficult to complete the final puzzle!
Although Chen Meng domineeringly announced that the era of Chen Meng after winning the women's singles championship at the Tokyo Olympics has arrived, in fact, this remark was quickly opposed by Liu Guoliang, who believes that just because he won the Olympic championship once, it cannot be said that it belongs to his own era, and if he wants to create his own era, he needs to get more championships to prove himself!
But after Chen Meng's Tokyo Olympics, he did not do what he wanted, not only did he not get more championships, but he fell into the embarrassing situation that a crown is hard to find!
In the National Games and World Table Tennis Championships of the Tokyo Olympics, Chen Meng lost to Wang Manyu in the semifinals twice in a row and did not qualify for the final, which also made Wang Manyu the only athlete who did not win the Olympic singles championship since the era of Deng Yaping, and won the championship in the National Games and World Table Tennis Championships next year!
Since the Tokyo Olympics, Chen Meng has only won the Singapore Grand Slam once in 2022, and in the rest of the matches, Chen Meng's performance is not outstanding!
Not only that, Chen Meng's external war is also unstable!
In fact, Chen Meng's ability to qualify for the singles competition at the Tokyo Olympics relied on his undefeated record against Mimato Ito!
But after the Tokyo Olympics, Chen Meng lost to Romania's Szokos and Samara!
To be honest, if Chen Meng loses to Mimato Ito, Hina Hayata and other foreign association players, it is actually not so surprising, after all, Ito Mimai Hina Hayata is indeed a first-class master and has a certain strength!
But Szokos and Samara, who can only belong to second-rate players, have rarely been able to defeat Chinese female table tennis players before, but they have defeated Chen Meng twice!
And this just reflects that Chen Meng's state has declined significantly as he grows older!
Durban World Table Tennis Championships, for Chen Meng, is the last chance to impact the Grand Slam, after all, Chen Meng is almost 30 years old, if you can't seize the opportunity this time, want to compete for the World Table Tennis Championships singles championship in two years, it is almost an impossible task!
At the World Table Tennis Championships in Durban, Chen Meng's strongest opponents are still his teammates Sun Yingsha and Wang Manyu.
But Wang Manyu's current physical condition has problems, if he can't completely recover before the World Table Tennis Championships, I'm afraid it will be difficult to stop Chen Meng!
Therefore, Chen Meng is likely to focus his attention on Sun Yingsha and use this time to study Sun Yingsha's techniques and tactics!
Can Chen Meng win the World Table Tennis Championships in Durban and become the sixth Grand Slam winner of Chinese women's table tennis?
Let's wait and see!