(by Steve Hopkins)
When’s the last time at a major event that the table tennis community looked at the results and said, What’s Up With China? It could be the venue or the fans or the altitude or the humidity, but at the ITTF-Asian Table Tennis Championships, China is not performing at the elite level we’ve seen time and time again.
In the team events, China’s Men won – but they had the top four players and they dropped a couple of matches (and were pressed to 3-2 a number of times in wins). The men were still dominant, but they were not unbeatable. The women, on the other hand, uncharacteristically fell to Japan in the Final. Again, second place is still a success – but when you are able to compete will almost all of the top players on one team, you are expected to win.
Then the top seeds began to fall in singles. Wang Chuqin lost to Oh Junsung 1-3 in the Quarterfinals, Liang Jingkun fell 0-3 to Noshad Alamiyan (the second big upset of an Iranian over China this tournament), and after wildcards Xiang Peng and Xu Yingbin lost, Lin Shidong was the last Chinese player standing. Shidong will face Hiroto Shinozuka in one Semifinal, and and Korea’s Junsung Oh will face Tomokazu Harimoto in the other. Both Semis and Finals will be played on Sunday.
In Men’s Singles, only one of four awarded medals will go to China. In Women’s Singles, the result is even more bleak for China. Sun Yingsha lost in her opening match to Adelina Khasanova of Uzbekistan. Wang Yidi lost to North Korea’s Kim Kum Yong in the Round of 16. Kuai Man fell to Shin Yubin in the Round of 16, and the final Chinese player Chen Xingtong fell to Miwa Harimoto in the Quarters.
What did that mean? It meant no Chinese player made the Final Four in Women’s Singles despite having the top three seeds in the event. In one Semifinal, it was Miwa Harimoto over Mima Ito 3-1, and in the other Semifinal it was Kim Kum Yong over Hoi Kem Doo 3-0. The Final will be played on Sunday.
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