Although it has not yet been officially announced, fans are actually very clear that with the end of the women's singles semifinals of the WTT Saudi Arabia Grand Slam on May 10, Chen Meng has now qualified for the singles competition in the Paris Olympics!
And Wang Manyu, who had a high voice before, had no choice but to lose the singles of the Paris Olympics!
This also puzzled many fans who like Wang Manyu:
In the Paris Olympic cycle, Wang Manyu's results are not bad!
Let's first take a look at Wang Manyu's achievements in the Paris Olympic cycle!
In the 2021 National Games, Wang Manyu defeated Chen Meng and Sun Yingsha in the women's singles competition and won the women's singles championship!
At the 2021 World Table Tennis Championships in Houston, Wang Manyu defeated Chen Meng and Sun Yingsha successively to win the women's singles championship!
2022 Macau Championships. Wang Manyu defeated Liu Shiwen in the final and won the women's singles championship!
In the 2022 Budapest Championship, Wang Manyu defeated Wang Yidi in the final and won the final women's singles championship!
In the 2023 Macau Championship, Wang Manyu defeated Chen Meng in the final and won the women's singles championship!
At the 2023 Pyeongchang Asian Championships, Wang Manyu defeated Chen Meng, Wang Yidi and Sun Yingsha successively to win the final women's singles championship.
In the Taiyuan Challenge in 2023, Wang Manyu defeated Wang Yidi in the final and won the women's singles championship.
In the 2024 Singapore Grand Slam, Wang Manyu defeated Chen Meng in the semifinals and Wang Yidi in the final, winning the women's singles championship of the Grand Slam for the first time.
In the entire Paris Olympic cycle, Wang Manyu has won eight singles championships, which can be said to be second only to Sun Yingsha!
So, what championships did Chen Meng win in the Paris Olympic cycle?
Chen Meng won the women's singles championship once in the 2022 Singapore Grand Slam during the Paris Olympic cycle! At that time, the opponent he defeated in the final was Wang Manyu!
In the same Olympic cycle, Wang Manyu won eight singles championships, why hasn't he competed for one of Chen Meng's championships?
The answer is actually very simple, just two words: stable!
From the overall situation, Wang Manyu's performance in the Paris Olympic cycle is indeed better than Chen Meng's, but Chen Meng's advantage lies in two words: stability!
Although Chen Meng has not won many championships, but in various competitions, Chen Meng's performance is very stable, for example, last year, Chen Meng has successfully reached the finals in many competitions such as the Macau Championships, the Durban World Table Tennis Championships, the Ljubljana Challenge, and the Lanzhou Star Challenge!
Compared with Chen Meng, Wang Manyu's performance is not very stable!
For example, after successfully winning the 2021 World Table Tennis Championships in Houston, Wang Manyu lost to Du Kaiqin in the first round of the Singapore World Cup finals in a blink of an eye!
In the 2022 Macau Championship, Wang Manyu faced Yuan Jiannan in the second round, and the result was out early!
In addition, in last year's Durban World Table Tennis Championships and Nagoya Finals, Wang Manyu lost to Chen Xingtong one after another and missed the semifinals!
Even in this year's Saudi Arabia Grand Slam, Wang Manyu lost to India's Batra in the second round of women's singles!
Wang Manyu's strength is undoubted, but in the game, the state is not very stable, and when he plays well, he can defeat any opponent, but once he encounters difficulties, it is difficult to get rid of it!
For the coaching staff, they don't pay much attention to which athlete can win the championship in the Olympic Games, they pay more attention to the fact that the final champion must belong to the Chinese team!
So in this case, Chen Meng, whose performance is more stable, still stands out from the competition!
For Wang Manyu, it is indeed a pity! At the last moment of the competition, he lost to the Indian player, which caused his previous efforts to fall short and he was out of the game!
I also hope that Wang Manyu can learn this lesson, strengthen his stability in the later games, improve his ability to resist pressure, and miss the singles of the Paris Olympics this time, and can continue to work hard for the singles of the 2028 Olympic Games! Go for it!