As the leader of the Japanese men's table tennis team, Mizutani Hayabusa can be said to be an old opponent of the Chinese team, and he is very familiar with Chinese players, so among all the Chinese players, who is the opponent he fears the most? Mizutani Hayabusa gave two, one is Ma Long, and the other is Zhang Jike, why are they two? This former "Japanese first brother" gave his own reasons!
Mizutani said that although the Chinese team has many excellent players, and they have all played against each other, they basically win and lose each other, but if you want to say which player in China is the most difficult to play, and you don't want to play against him the most, then only Ma Long and Zhang Jike, because their ability is too strong, and the state is particularly stable, it is difficult to win against such a strong opponent.
In fact, what Mizutani Falcon said is not an exaggeration, because from the point of view of the record, these two are real "crushing games" against Mizutani Falcon, Zhang Jike and Mizutani Falcon have played a total of 7 times, Zhang Jike won all, the most classic game between the two is the 2010 World Cup semifinals, when Mizutani Falcon played super, once led 3:0, as long as he won another game, he would win, and at this time, Zhang Jike's "small universe" broke out, four games in a row, and finally achieved a big reversal.
Mizutani Hayabusa's characteristics are sideways and positive attacks, the ball is fast and powerful, and many players can't adapt to it, but this trick is useless to Zhang Jike, so except for the 2010 World Cup semifinals, the other games between the two are basically completely one-sided, and Mizutani Falcon is completely suppressed.
Of course, not only was crushed by Zhang Jike, Ma Long was also the "bitter master" of Mizutani Falcon's career, the two played against each other a total of 16 times, Ma Long actually won 16 games in a row, only at the 2008 Singapore Open, the two played to the tiebreaker, and the other games, it is no exaggeration to say that Mizutani Falcon was completely beaten, and the gap between the two was too big.
Because Ma Long at his peak, there are almost no shortcomings, whether it is near and far platform attack and defense, or receiving serve, it is the top level in history, and more importantly, Ma Long never makes mistakes, just imagine, in the face of such an opponent, it is really difficult to defeat him.
Of course, some fans will say that in addition to Ma Long and Zhang Jike, Xu Xin and Mizutani Falcon's results are also one-sided, the two have played each other a total of 17 times, Xu Xin is 15-2, why is Mizutani Falcon not afraid of him? Regarding this, Mizutani Falcon also explained, he believes that although Xu Xin has a good record, he is not afraid to fight him, because their strength is completely between the two and the best, and they have won him.
Winning those two times happened in the Olympic Games, one was the men's team final of the 2016 Rio Olympics, Xu Xin lost to Mizutani Hayabusa 2:3, and the other was the mixed doubles final of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, Mizutani Hayabusa and Ito Misei combined, defeated Xu Xin and Liu Shiwen, and won the final gold medal.