Table Tennis: China Wins All But One in US Open/ITTF Pro Tour

Wang Liqin staged a strong rally from two sets down to take the men's singles title, enabling China to win three out of four gold medals at the US Open/ITTF Pro Tour in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida on Saturday.

The second-ranked Chinese defeated Chiang Peng-Lung of Chinese Taipei 16-21, 15-21, 21-18, 22-20 and 21-11 in 75 minutes at the Howard County Conventional Center.

Earlier, Wang Nan outpowered her Chinese compatriot Sun Jin 21-11, 21-17 and 23-21 for the women's title and Kong Linghui paired with Liu Guoliang won the men's doubles by beating another Chinese due of Wang Liqin and Yan Sen 21-14, 20-22 and 21-16.

Chinese Taipei won the women's doubles through Chen Jing and Xu Jing who defeated Yang Ying and Sun Jin 21-18 and 21-15.

"It's a great performance for Wang Liqin as he rallied back from two sets down and two break points in the fourth set," said Cai Zhenhua, head coach of the Chinese table tennis team.

"Wang should play better in the first two sets but he failed to carry on his tactics forcefully in the later stages," Cai said, " however, Chiang also had a great performance and we will devote more efforts to prepare for the coming Olympic Games."

Wang was out of the rhythm in the first two sets wherein he squandered his slim lead once the scoreboard number 10 above for either side.

Starting from the third set, Wang once led 17-13 but lost four points in his serves before hitting a string of smashes for the beginning of the strong rally.

The fourth set was deadlocked 10-all and 15-all before Wang faced two championships points when he lagged behind 18-20, however he spared no efforts to choke the last four points in a row for an exciting ending, a surprise to most of the American audience.

In the decider, Wang rushed ahead 8-3 before a time-out from Chinese Taipei, exchanged the court leading 10-4, and enlarged the margin to 19-11 before serving out the marathon match for a prize money of 13,000 US dollars.

The US Open/ITTF Pro Tour attracted 77 top players from the world as it served as the penultimate leg prior to the Olympic Games.

All the players will fly to Brazil days later for the last stop of the Tour.



People's Daily Online --- http://www.peopledaily.com.cn/english/