Defending Champion Beaten in Barcelona
China’s Ma Lin, the number two seed and the defending
champion,departed proceedings at the quarter-final stage of
the Liebherr Men’s World Cup in Barcelona on Saturday
13th October 2007.
He was beaten in five games by Korea’s Ryu Seung Min,
the reigning Olympic Men’s Singles champion; it was
twelfth time that the pair had met in a World Ranking event;
quite incredibly it was the first time that Ryu Seung Min
had ever won.
Furthermore, the Korean almost failed to qualify for the
second stage of proceedings. In the morning session of play
he needed to beat Chinese Taipei’s Chuan Chih-Yuan to
gain second place in the group and thus proceed to the last
eight.
He trailed by three games to two, he was down 3-7 in the
sixth, he levelled and then saved seven match points before
winning the game 20-18 and then succeeding by the narrowest
of margins in the decisive seventh.
Defeat for Ma Lin but no such problems for the other highly
seeded players.
Wang Hao, the top seed, beat Singapore’s Gao Ning in
a hard fought five games duel whilst his Chinese national
team colleague, Wang Liqin seeded three, maintained his superb
form to overcome Austria’s Werner Schlager.
Wang Liqin was in superb form as was the fourth seed, Germany’s
Timo Boll; he won the all European battle, defeating Vladimir
Samsonov of Belarus in five games.
It was the third time in the space of three years that Timo
Boll and Vladimir Samsonov had met in the Liebherr Men’s
World Cup. It was the first time that Timo Boll had won.
In the semi-finals, Wang Hao plays Timo Boll whilst Wang
Liqin faces Ryu Seung Min.
Quarter-Finals
Wang Hao (CHN) bt Gao Ning (SIN) 11-2. 13-11, 11-13, 11-4,
11-3
Timo Boll (GER) bt Vladimir Samsonov (BLR) 11-3, 11-8, 11-7,
2-11, 11-7
Wang Liqin (CHN) bt Werner Schlager (AUT) 11-7, 11-4, 11-7,
11-9
Ryu Seung Min (KOR) bt Ma Lin (CHN) 12-10, 11-7, 6-11, 13-11,
13-11.
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"Source:
ITTF Press Release