The 2024 ITTF Singles World Cup continues, Ma Long and Hayasuke Togami met in the men's singles 1/4 finals, and under the unfavorable situation of losing one game first and falling behind twice with a total score of 0-1 and 1-2, Ma Long overcame difficulties and won three games in a row, and finally reversed the Japanese star Hayasuke Togami with a total score of 4-2, becoming the first player to advance to the top 4 in this World Cup national table tennis!
Malone is ranked 4th in the world and Hayasuke Togami is ranked 25th in the world. Ma Long has won the World Cup men's singles championship twice. In the last round, Malone defeated world No. 5 Felix Lebrun 4-2 to advance to the quarterfinals, and after the game, Malone also said that the intensity of the game was very high, and due to his age, he did not recover as quickly as young players, which is the main difficulty for Malone at this stage. Hayasuke Togami also fought hard in six games, defeating Egypt's Omar Asal with a total score of 4-2 to advance to the quarterfinals.
In the first game, Ma Long entered the state a little slowly, and failed to limit Hayasuke in the first three boards, although he played well in the middle and once chased the score, but Hayasuke Togami maintained his offensive firepower and took the lead 11-5.
In the second game, Ma Long did a very good job in his own service round, using forehand attack to suppress the household Hayasuke Kami, and Ma Long paid attention to the change of the landing point, with a short forehand and a long backhand ball, constantly mobilizing Hayasuke Togami, returning the opponent with 11-5 and chasing the big score to a 1-1 draw.
In the third game, Hayasuke Togami seized Ma Long's short introduction error to score a forehand score, and in addition, he also had the upper hand in the backhand position, and Hayasuke Togami built a large 6-1 lead with momentum. Malone chased consecutive points in the return round, chasing it to 4-6, forcing Hayasuke Togami to call a timeout. After the timeout, Malone took Hayasuke off guard with a long ball in reverse rotation and chased it to 5-6. However, Hayasuke Togami also changed in the first three boards, played a service attack, and maintained the lead 8-6. After scoring two more points, 10-6, Hayasuke Togami took the lead in getting the game point, Ma Long recovered one point, and Hayasuke Togami won the third game 11-7, leading Ma Long 2-1.
In the fourth game of the two sides, Ma Long sent two forehands in a row, but the effect was not good, Hayasuke Togami twisted two long balls in the backhand position, Ma Long scored 6 points in a row 7-3 in the case of 1-3 behind, Hayasuke Togami served to stop the bleeding, Ma Long stabilized the situation and took the lead in getting the game point 10-5, and the coach Wang Hao on the sidelines also clenched his fists with both hands and roared! Hayasuke Togami chased two points in a row, and Ma Long cashed in the game point 11-7 and tied the big score again.
In the crucial fifth game, Ma Long fully mobilized his enthusiasm, opened the score early, won 11-3, and won a game of Tianwang Mountain. In the sixth game, Ma Long became more and more courageous, 7-0 completely crazy, Hayasuke Togami failed to chase the score, Ma Long won three games in a row with a big score of 1-2 and reversed Hayasuke Togami 4-2 to advance to the men's singles semifinals.