National Games: table tennis titans Fan Zhendong and Chen Meng march on towards singles gold
- Men’s world number one Fan closely followed by number three Xu as number two Ma searches for doubles redemption
- Women’s star Chen must fend off the in-form Sun and Wang as singles, doubles and mixed teams glory awaits
Men’s world number three Xu Xin of Shanghai beat Zhou Yu of Henan 4-1 in the singles quarter-final. The 31-year-old former world number one competes alongside women’s speedster Liu Shiwen in a “joint team” against Lin Gaoyuan and Huang Weiqi of Guangdong in the mixed doubles semi-final this evening.
The 27-year-old Chen had said ahead of the event that winning a medal at the National Games was harder than at the Olympics.
Hebei’s Sun Yingsha showed why she is considered China’s next women’s table tennis torch-bearer after comfortably dispatching Zhang Chi of Guangdong in the singles quarter-finals. The 20-year-old world number two has an opportunity to make amends against Chen after losing to her in the final in Tokyo two months ago.
World number four Wang Manyu had a busy day representing Heilongjiang, beginning with a 3-1 doubles win alongside Che Xiao against Tibet’s Xu Jiarui and Zhu Peiyu in the women’s doubles quarter-final.
The 22-year-old Wang, who beat higher-ranked Chen and Sun twice in the Chinese Olympic scrimmage earlier in the year, also continued her singles campaign by beating Liu Fei of Jiangsu in a back-and-forth match, which ended 4-2. She teams up with fellow Heilongjiang teammate Cao Wei against Jiangsu’s Sun Wen and Qian Tianyi in the mixed doubles semi-final in the evening.
Two of Hong Kong’s future women’s stars, Ng Wing-lam, 18, and Chau Wing-sze, 19, finished their women’s doubles campaign after losing to Wu Yangchen and Xu Nuo of Zhejiang 1-3 in the last 16. Ng, ranked number one in Hong Kong at both under-21 and under-18 level, and teammate Chau said they were thankful to play against elite-level competition having lost in the singles rounds the previous day.
Meanwhile, Hong Kong men’s prospects Su Zhi and Prince Choy Chun-kit lost to Xie Fei and Xi Sheng of Hubei 0-3 in the men’s doubles last 16. The 21-year-old Su, ranked first in Hong Kong, will be disappointed having also bowed out of the singles category on Wednesday.
Seventeen-year-old men’s teammates Yiu Kwan-to and Baldwin Chan Ho-wah did not compete having also lost in the singles preliminaries. Team Hong Kong did not reach the last 32 in their respective men’s and women’s singles and mixed doubles events this week.
