In table tennis, it is a high honor to have the singles championship of the World Cup, the World Table Tennis Championships and the Olympic Games at the same time, and it is also called a "Grand Slam" player by the media and fans. However, after the suspension of the World Cup table tennis competition, there are not many players who still have a chance to win Grand Slam honors. Today, let's analyze who the national table tennis players have had, and which players will have the opportunity to win the achievements of the table tennis grand slam in the future.
The men's table tennis World Cup was founded in 1980, the first champion was Guo Yuehua of China, and since then, the event has been held annually. The 1990 Men's Team World Cup was born, but was held separately from the men's singles World Cup. In the men's singles, Chinese players won 18 of them, and European players divided 14 of them.
The most won men's singles World Cup titles in history are Ma Lin and Fan Zhendong, both of whom have won the honor four times. Ma Lin won the World Cup men's singles championship in 2000, 2003, 2004 and 2006; Fan Zhendong has won the World Cup men's singles championship four times in 2016, 2018, 2019 and 2020.
The Women's Table Tennis World Cup was founded in 1990 and initially only held women's team competitions. In 1996, the women's World Cup singles competition was held, and the first World Cup women's singles champion was Deng Yaping. The most won women's World Cup champions in history is Liu Shiwen, who won the World Cup women's singles championship five times in 2009, 2012, 2013, 2015 and 2019, in addition to Wang Nan and Zhang Yining have won four World Cup women's singles championships. In 2016, Miu Hirano of Japan won the World Cup women's singles title, and she was the only female player outside of China to win the Women's World Cup.
In November 2020, Chen Meng defeated Sun Yingsha in her hometown of Shandong to win the last World Cup women's singles championship, bringing an end to the Women's Singles World Cup. In the last men's World Cup held at the same time, Fan Zhendong defeated Ma Long and finished the men's table tennis World Cup. In addition, the table tennis World Cup team competition has long been suspended after the last edition in 2019.
With the restructuring of the ITTF tour competition, WTT competitions have sprung up, because the WTT series has a high amount of prize money, a small number of participants, and the competition is exciting, tense and exciting, and the WTT World Cup finals have replaced the original World Cup singles matches since 2021. But is the World Cup finals one of the world's three major tournaments? Is the winner of the World Cup Finals considered a World Champion? At first, there were also many opinions and inconsistencies. When the State General Administration of Sports no longer recognized Sun Yingsha's 2021 World Cup finals women's singles champion as the world champion, the controversy ended.
Originally, before the Tokyo Olympics, Liu Shiwen was the most promising female athlete to win a Grand Slam. Liu Shiwen 5 World Cup women's singles champions in hand, in 2019 28-year-old Liu Shiwen participated in the World Table Tennis Championships for the sixth time, the sky paid off, in the women's singles semifinals Liu Shiwen defeated Ding Ning 4:2, defeated Chen Meng in the final, won the first career World Table Tennis Championships women's singles championship. However, due to the postponement of the Tokyo Olympics for one year, Liu Shiwen's condition has declined, and Liu Shiwen passed by the table tennis competition of the Tokyo Olympics with the women's singles qualification.
In this way, in the case of the end of the World Cup singles competition, with the retirement of Liu Shiwen, the current national table tennis players have the opportunity to achieve Grand Slam achievements in the future, leaving Fan Zhendong and Chen Meng. From the current point of view, the closest to the individual Grand Slam is female table tennis player Chen Meng.
Chen Meng is a late bloomer, and her most notable individual achievement is the three-in-a-row title of the year-end finals. In 2020, Chen Meng began to return to her form, this year she won her last World Cup title, and defeated Sun Yingsha at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics to win the women's singles gold medal. However, just when people were talking about whether Chen Meng could become the fastest women's Grand Slam, at the World Table Tennis Championships in Houston, Chen Meng lost to Wang Manyu 3:4 in the semifinals and missed the Grand Slam.
The upcoming World Table Tennis Championships in Durban, South Africa, is Chen Meng's best chance to win the Grand Slam, and perhaps her last chance. Japan's Jiajun Ishikawa, who is 1 year older than Chen Meng, has announced his retirement, and for the 29-year-old Chen Meng, injuries and physical fitness have brought him great difficulty to continue to compete in the next World Table Tennis Championships. Of course, it is not easy for Chen Meng to win the championship and realize his dream of a Grand Slam in this World Table Tennis Championships. At present, Sun Yingsha is becoming more and more mature, Wang Manyu is striving to defend the title, Wang Yidi and other players are also benevolent, and foreign association players are still looking at the tiger. All of the above situations have brought great difficulty to Chen Meng to win the championship, and the World Table Tennis Championships will enter the knockout round from the 128th place, and every game must not be missed if you want to win the championship. Therefore, the World Table Tennis Championships is a competition that cannot be made wrong and cannot be upset.
If Chen Meng can win the women's singles gold medal at the Durban World Table Tennis Championships, she can prove her strength and achievements to the world, and she will also become another and last women's Grand Slam player in Chinese women's table tennis after Ding Ning, which will be a perfect ending for Chen Meng's career and will continue to inspire her to perform better in future competitions.
Relatively speaking, Fan Zhendong, who already holds the World Cup and the World Table Tennis Championships men's singles championship, is in a much better situation, and Fan Zhendong only needs to win the Olympic men's singles championship again to achieve Grand Slam achievements. Fan Zhendong, 26, is at the peak of his career, and he has the strength to beat any men's table tennis singles player on the planet. As long as Fan Zhendong continues his form and there are no big ups and downs and fluctuations, winning the men's singles gold medal at the Paris Olympics next year is a reasonable and highly anticipated event.
Based on the present, Fan Zhendong also needs to continue to output good results. Because after the Durban World Table Tennis Championships, the ITTF's points will usher in a relatively large adjustment, although he has maintained the men's singles world ranking number one for 3 years, but has narrowed the point gap with the second place. At the end of May, Fan Zhendong's 2,000 points for winning the 2021 Houston World Table Tennis Championships, as well as some points for other competitions, will all be cleared, and by July, Fan Zhendong's 2022 Singapore Grand Slam championship points will also be cleared. If Wang Chuqin or Ma Long can win the World Table Tennis Championships, they will receive 2,000 points, and the result of this trade-off, they surpass Fan Zhendong's world ranking No. 1, which will become a possibility.
As the leader of Chinese men's table tennis, Fan Zhendong has a heavy responsibility on his shoulders, and he needs to carefully prepare for the battle, carefully study the different playing styles of athletes from various countries, and adopt targeted training, which cannot tolerate the slightest negligence and carelessness. At the World Table Tennis Championships in Durban, Fan Zhendong should strive to successfully defend the men's singles championship while maintaining his world number one position, which is his top priority. As for the Grand Slam ideal, the future should be a matter of course. (All pictures are from the Internet, invaded and deleted)