THE International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF) Korean Air Korea Open this week will show off an innovative feature.
Male players from the sport’s juggernauts China will pair up with paddlers from other countries in the men’s doubles event in a bid to improve competition and, hopefully, boost the sport’s growth.
The Chinese did not consider men’s doubles teams from the Singapore Table Tennis Association (STTA).
Contacted yesterday, STTA’s high-performance manager Eddy Tay said: “We are open to exploring this option in the future if they invite us, but there are several things to think about.”
Competition exposure for Singapore’s own doubles pairings and gaining ranking points to qualify for the annual World Tour Grand Finals are among the considerations of the STTA.
Singapore are represented by 11 paddlers in the Korean Open in Incheon, including top players like women’s world No. 4 Feng Tianwei, Yu Mengyu, Zhan Jian and Yang Zi.
Zhan Jian (far right) and Yang Zi (right) will start their men’s doubles campaign tomorrow in the main draw, while the tandems of Li Hu and Ma Liang and Chen Feng and Xin Zhaoxu begin in the pre-rounds.
Table tennis: No Chinese help for Singapore men
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