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Olympic Direct Qualification

Decision about Players from Hong Kong

The ITTF selected twenty male and twenty female players as Olympic direct qualifiers according to the ITTF 2008 January World Ranking with a maximum of two players per National Olympic Committee (NOC).

Taking into consideration the passports and identity documents provided so far from the players from Hong Kong, the ITTF is obliged to take the following decisions.

1. To exclude Ms. LIN Ling (HKG) and Ms. TIE Yana (HKG) from the direct list of players qualified for the 2008 Olympic Games because they were not eligible on January 2008.

2. The next players to be considered as qualified from the January ITTF World Ranking list are Ms. ZHANG Rui (HKG) and Ms. LAU Sui Fei (HKG). Due to the fact that Ms. ZHANG Rui does not have a valid HKSAR passport either only Ms. LAU Sui Fei is provisionally accepted as direct qualified from the World Ranking list having the correct eligibility status.

3. To qualify directly from the World Ranking list the next player available Ms. NI Xia Lian from Luxembourg.

Decision in the Hands of the IOC

a) IOC Accepts Eligibility

If the International Olympic Committee (IOC) finally accepts the eligibility of the three female players from Hong Kong, LIN Ling, TIE Yana and ZHANG Rui, the first two mentioned players will still have a chance to qualify through the Final World Qualification Tournament (from 8th to 11th May).

Ms. ZHANG Rui will be qualified through the Continental quota since she qualified as one of eight players at the Asian Olympic Qualification Tournament on 9th March. In this case the Hong Kong Table Tennis Association may ask the ITTF to withdraw Ms. LAU Sui Fei from the top twenty direct qualification ranking list. The ITTF will then select the next player from the January World Ranking list to complete the top twenty players qualified from this list.

b) IOC Does not Accept Eligibility

If the IOC does not accept the eligibility of LIN Ling, TIE Yana and ZHANG Rui, then LAU Sui Fei will be accepted as a definitive direct qualified player from the ITTF World Ranking list, provided that the Table Tennis Association and the Olympic Committee of Hong Kong confirm her eligibility and availability.

The Hong Kong Table Tennis Association can still enter two other players fulfilling the IOC eligibility requirements to the Final World Olympic Qualification Tournament. In this case, the reserve number 1 of the Asian Olympic Qualification Tournament (Ms. HUANG I-Hwa from Chinese Taipei) will also be qualified from the Asian Continental quota.