On May 2, the quarterfinals of the top half of the region were held at the Tongyou Cup in Chengdu, China. The final result was: China 3-1 India, Malaysia 3-1 Japan.
Surprisingly, just when the Chinese team was still fighting hard with the Indian team, there was news from the next stadium that the Malaysian team eliminated the Japanese team 3-1;
After the Chinese team's game was over, we went to take a look at the situation of the Japanese team, and it turned out that the Japanese team was dying.
In this year's Soup Cup, the Japanese men's team should be relatively strong. Their first singles Kodai Naraoka is ranked No. 5 in the world, one pair Takuro Hoki/Yugo Kobayashi is ranked No. 6 in the world, Kenta Nishimoto is ranked No. 11 in the world in the second singles, Teru Koga/Taichi Saito is ranked No. 16 in the world, Koki Watanabe is ranked No. 22 in the world in the third singles, and Kento Momota is ranked No. 52 in the world in the fourth singles.
In the quarter-finals, Malaysia's first singles Li Zijia is ranked 10th in the world, the first pair is Xie Dingfeng/Su Weiyi is ranked 5th in the world, the second singles Liang Junhao is ranked 37th in the world, the second doubles Wu Shifei/Izudin is ranked 15th in the world, and the third singles He Shouwei is ranked 233rd in the world.
In other words, on paper alone, the Japanese team has an advantage in one single, two singles and three singles, and the first and second doubles are only one place lower than Malaysia's world rankings, and this quarter-final should be won.
However, the Japanese team's brain pumped and hid a single order of Kodai Naraoka.
This is to learn the ancestors' "Tian Ji Horse Racing" upside down, with the middle horse against the horse, the horse against the middle horse, but put the horse on the South Mountain, this is no accident is strange.
As a result, Li Zijia defeated Kenta Nishimoto 2-0, with a score of 21-13 and 21-3 in the two games, and Japan lost so badly;
Watanabe Hanggui lost 0-2 to Liang Junhao, with a score of 13-21 and 10-21 in the two games, and Japan's second singles also lost miserably;
Japan's second pair Teru Koga/Taiichi Saito lost 1-2 to Wu Shifei/Izudin;
Even though Japan's pair of Takuro Hoki/Yugo Kobayashi defeated Xie Dingfeng/Su Weiyi 2-1, they were still eliminated 1-3.
After the game, even Malaysia's Li Zijia was interviewed and wondered: Why didn't they go to Naraoka Kodai?
To be clear: Kodai Naraoka played in this year's Soup Cup and played against Germany in the group stage, winning 2-0.
So why did the Japanese team not go to Kodai Naraoka? Some people say that it is to let Kento Momota, who retired after the soup cup, play three singles, but this argument is unreasonable. If you want Momota to play three singles, you can directly replace Watanabe Hanggui without having to move the two people in front.
Personally, I think that the Japanese team wants Naraoka Kodai to accumulate physical strength and prepare to defeat China's single Shi Yuqi in the semifinals. In many sports competitions, the Japanese team has their eyes on the Chinese team, and they are bent on beating the only Chinese team, and interestingly, they often capsize halfway, and often can't come to the Chinese team alive.
Of course, we don't really take them seriously.