World Team Table Tennis Championships in Guangzhou, China
Problems for Men’s Seeds
There were problems for both the third and fourth seeds in
the group stage matches of the Championship Division of the
Men’s Team event at the Evergrande World Team Championships
in Guangzhou, China on Wednesday 27th February 2008; both
Germany and Singapore suffered defeats.
Seeded three, Germany lost by three matches to one against
the very impressive Japanese outfit of Jun Mizutani, Kan Yo
and Kaii Yoshida, whilst Singapore suffered at the hands of
the Hong Kong trio comprising Tang Peng, Li Ching and Ko Lai
Chak.
Matters started well for Germany with Bastian Steger recovering
from an opening game deficit to beat Jun Mizutani but that
was their only success. Dimitrij Ovtcharov lost to both Kan
Yo and Jun Mizutani whilst Christian Süss suffered at
the hands of Kaii Yoshida.
A team effort from Japan whilst for Hong Kong, it was very
much Tang Peng who was the architect of Singapore’s
downfall. He beat both Yang Zi and Gao Ning whilst Ko Lai
Chak overcame Cai Xiao Li to add the one further Hong Kong
success. The one win for Singapore came from Gao Ning who
beat Li Ching.
Defeats for the third and fourth seeded teams but not for
the top two with China defeating Austria by three matches
to nil and Korea overcoming Chinese Taipei with loss of one
individual match; that being the defeat of Ryu Seung Min,
the reigning Olympic champion, by Chuan Chih-Yuan.
Meanwhile, in the Championship Division of the Women’s
Team event, matches in the group stage came to a conclusion
with the top four seeded teams all remaining unbeaten.
In the final stage one series of matches, top seeds China
beat Sweden, second seeds Singapore overcame Ukraine, third
seeds Hong Kong accounted for Thailand and fourth seeds, Japan
doused French hopes.
The teams finishing in second and third places in the group
stage duly progressed to the first round where the top four
seeds receive byes.
Tense moments were therefore the order of proceedings late
in the evening of the fourth day’s play with Romania,
Austria, Hungary and the Netherlands duly booking their places
in the quarter-finals.
All four fixtures went the full five match distance. Romania
overcame Germany, Austria secured victory against the United
States; the Netherlands excelled to win against Korea and
Hungary ended Croatian medal dreams.
At the quarter-final stage China plays Romania, Hong Kong
meets Austria, Japan confronts Hungary and Singapore faces
the Netherlands.
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"Source:
ITTF Press Release