■On December 15, Wang Yidi served in the game. Xinhua News Agency
■On December 10, the Chinese team combination Wang Chuqin in the mixed doubles match. Xinhua News Agency
■On December 15, Zhang Rui served in the game. Xinhua News Agency
The WTT Finals are underway
Yesterday, Beijing time, the WTT (World Table Tennis Professional League) 2023 Women's Finals started shooting in Nagoya (Japan). For the national table tennis team, the WTT Finals is the final exam of the 2023 season and an important training session ahead of the 2024 Busan Table Tennis World Team Championships and the Paris Olympics. At last month's pledge meeting, Liu Guoliang, chairman of the Chinese Table Tennis Association, made it clear that "we must fully mobilize everyone's enthusiasm in the competition at the end of the year and sound the charge for the Paris Olympics preparations!"
National table tennis won the championship in Chengdu last week
Use actual combat to train for the Olympics
Last week, the Table Tennis Mixed Team World Cup in Chengdu was one of the important competitions of the national table tennis team. The national table tennis team easily defeated the South Korean team 8:1 in the championship match and won the championship. For the national table tennis team, winning the first ITTF Mixed Team World Cup not only trained the team, but also achieved the purpose of training for the Paris Olympic Games.
Winning the championship is naturally the result that can be expected before the game, and what is unpredictable is the process of winning the championship, and this process is the most worth remembering and summarizing. The newly created Mixed Team World Cup has a different format, with the best-of-15 rules somewhat similar to the Sudirman Cup in badminton, and there are corresponding rules and restrictions on the use of personnel in each match. Before the start of the mixed team World Cup, Liu Guoliang said that this is "the most exciting format", because you can't predict how long the match will be played, and you can't predict who will appear after three sets.
In the previous games, the national table tennis team played smoothly, and most of the games were passed with scores of 8:0, 8:1, and 8:2. It was not until the meeting with the Japanese team that the Chinese team encountered strong resistance, and finally after 13 rounds, the national table tennis team won 8:5. In the championship match with the South Korean team, the national table tennis team regained its form and won 8:1.
Despite the different competition systems, the first mixed team World Cup is still a training battle for the Paris Olympics that national table tennis attaches great importance to. In Chengdu, the national table tennis sent four players for each gender, and in the first set of mixed doubles, except for Lin Gaoyuan and Wang Manyu and Wang Yidi, Wang Chuqin/Sun Yingsha were all sent to Wang Chuqin/Sun Yingsha in the rest of the games. It can be seen from the arrangement of troops that the national table tennis has played a "bright card". This also shows the coaching staff's trust in the duo and their intention to learn as much as possible about their opponents and find problems. Wang Chuqin said that there is still a lot of gain after the mixed team World Cup this time, he said: "I found a lot of shortcomings, there are still a lot of space details to dig up, and I can do better." ”
Winning the championship in Chengdu injected a shot in the arm for the national table tennis team. With the victory of the mixed team World Cup in Chengdu, the national table tennis team only has two last events left on the schedule for the 2023 season: the women's finals and the men's finals. According to the schedule, on December 15th ~ 17th, the WTT Women's Finals will be played in Nagoya.
The first day of the women's finals ended
The national table tennis team locked the finals in advance
Yesterday, Beijing time, the WTT Women's Finals started in Nagoya, with a total prize fund of 340,000 US dollars (about 2.42 million yuan). Seven of the 16 women's singles players competing in the WTT Women's Finals are Chinese.
According to the schedule, the 16 highest-ranked players in the world will have to fight each other. In the 1/8 finals, Chen Meng VS Hina Hayada (Japan), Chen Xingtong VS Szokos (Romania), Wang Manyu VS Yang Xiaoxin (Singapore), Wang Yidi VS Shin Yubin (South Korea), Sun Yingsha VS Zhang Benmeihe (Japan), Zhang Rui VS Qian Tianyi. Except for Qian Tianyi, who lost to Zhang Rui in the "National Table Tennis Civil War", he failed to advance, and the remaining 6 Chinese players all successfully entered the top 8.
The other two players who advanced to the top eight were Germany's Han Ying and Japan's Mimato Ito.
The 1/4 finals are Chen Xingtong VS Wang Manyu, Zhang Rui VS Wang Yidi, Chen Meng VS Misei Ito, Sun Yingsha VS Han Ying. Although the 1/4 finals will be held on Saturday (December 16) afternoon, Beijing time, there are 6 Chinese players in the top 8, which means that the national table tennis team has locked a final seat in advance before the 1/4 finals start.
On Sunday afternoon, Beijing time, the WTT Women's Finals will be contested for the final. Previously, Sun Yingsha has won two WTT finals titles. "There is no doubt that Sun Yingsha wants to continue her dominance in this tournament, and whoever wants to remove her from the reigning champion will need to put in a considerable effort," the ITTF wrote on its official website. ”
Although the national table tennis girls are visiting the game this time, they are no strangers to the table. As a WTT Global Partner for 2022/2023, Pisces Sports' Dream 3 table is the official table of the event. Pisces is also the exclusive supplier of table tennis for the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games.
After the women's finals, the men's finals will also be held in Doha on January 3~5 next year. Then, the main focus of the national table tennis team is the World Table Tennis Championships team competition in Busan on February 16~25 next year. According to the rules, the top 8 men's and women's teams in the team competition of the World Table Tennis Championships will qualify for the Paris Olympics. In other words, the World Table Tennis Championships team competition is the qualifier for the Paris Olympics.
Chita D
Olympic table tennis singles changed new rules
The hegemony of the national table tennis team may be challenged
With the Paris 2024 Olympics approaching, the ITTF suddenly released a major policy change that upended the table tennis singles competition format, which has sparked widespread attention and discussion. Public opinion also speculates that the change of rules may affect the hegemony of the national table tennis team.
The new format stipulates that at the Paris Olympics, the men's and women's singles competitions will be completely eliminated, and each team can only send two players to participate in the competition, and they will be selected according to their rankings. The top 16 seeded players will go straight to the 64th main draw table, with the 1st ranked player automatically placed in the 1st and 2nd positions in the 64th position, the 3rd and 4th ranked players in the 32nd and 33rd positions, and the 5th to 8th ranked players in the 16th, 17th, 48th and 49th positions. The rest of the players were drawn by lot.
This means that players from the same country or region may compete in different half-divisions, adding to the level of competition. The ITTF stressed that the purpose of this change is to attract more fans and media attention, while also providing more opportunities for players ranked 17 to 32. However, the change of rules is not a small challenge for the Chinese table tennis team, which may lead to two players meeting in the quarterfinals or even the quarterfinals or even the quarterfinals.
Since the introduction of table tennis at the 1988 Seoul Olympics, the Chinese team has performed well in this event, winning gold medals many times. This monopoly has made the ITTF concerned about the decline in the attractiveness of the event, so it has been restricting the Chinese team for years by changing the rules – for example, from small to over, from a 21-point system to an 11-point system, and so on. However, the Chinese table tennis team has been able to adapt quickly to the new rules every time and maintain its leading position in the competitive level. I don't know what the national table tennis team will do after this revision of the rules of the event.
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December 22~24
The table tennis super finals will be held in Shenzhen
As a year-end blockbuster event, the 2023 China Table Tennis Club Super League Finals will be held at Shenzhen Longhua Cultural and Sports Center on December 22~24 this year. In this high-level final match, the main players of national table tennis will all appear, and it will also be another crucial annual finale before the 2024 Paris Olympics.
Judging from the relevant news announced so far, in the final stage of this year's Table Tennis Super League, the 12 active and retired world champions of national table tennis - among them, the main players Fan Zhendong, Wang Chuqin, Ma Long, Liang Jingkun, Lin Gaoyuan, Yu Ziyang, Xu Xin, Sun Yingsha, Wang Manyu, Chen Meng, Wang Yidi, Chen Xingtong will appear again, which is worth paying attention to.
This year's Table Tennis Super League is divided into two phases, and the first phase of the tournament has ended. The men's teams in the second stage of the finals are Shanghai Real Estate, Shandong Luneng, Shandong Weiqiao, and Shantou Mingrun, and the women's teams are Shenzhen University, Shandong Luneng, Shanghai Longteng, and Shanghai East China University of Technology. In the second stage of the competition, the champion will be determined by the rules of a single-elimination system, and the finals will last for 3 days.
■New Express reporter Wang Di