World Table Tennis Championships's schedule is advancing in full swing, and the attention of fans around the world continues to rise, finally reaching its first climax on the morning of the fifth day of the main event.
This morning there were four consecutive games that fans couldn't help but be excited about.
Hook vs Bai Feng.
Morad vs Fan Xiaodong.
Wang Chao vs Bayer.
Luo Jiu vs Lin Zijun.
In any of these games, no coach dares to say that he can guess the outcome.
When the European media interviewed Rohlskov, Rohlskov said, "I believe in my players."
European media interviewed Old Wa. Old Wa said that "sometimes the experience of the game is more important than the victory or defeat."
When Asian media interviewed He Jingping, He Jingping directly said "I don't know."
Don't use the winning or losing relationship in the past six months to define the winning or losing on World Table Tennis Championships. As Qin Huachang explained during the live broadcast yesterday, the Chinese table tennis players in the three major competitions may not be much different from those in the open competition, but the players of non-Chinese associations will really be reborn.
In this case, the ones who deserve the most vigilance are actually the veterans, not the group of supernovas who have just emerged in the new generation.
Because the thickness of the veteran may be beyond your imagination.
When they usually play based on instinct, you will feel that they are older, slower, less powerful, less responsive, and even their skills are outdated.
But when veterans really calm down and are willing to devote all their energy and efforts to studying their opponents, they will come up with many targeted tactics that you can't even think of.
Yes, veterans are indeed no longer as good as young people in terms of physical strength and energy, but they have too much on-field experience. They have all kinds of strange thoughts about how to handle every ball. Some of their details are so delicate that young players may never dream of.
Therefore, when Huaping internally ranks players non-Chinese associations, the threat level of Bayer is even higher than Hook.
Similarly, when player non-Chinese associations ranked the threat level of Chinese table tennis players, Bai Feng was not as scary as Wang Chao.
The stadium was full of spectators that morning, and many people even stood in the middle aisle to watch the game. In fact, they couldn't see the table in the distance at all. They could only look up at the big screen in front of their heads, but even so, they still came to the scene to feel the fiery atmosphere.
There is no doubt that local Hungarian fans support European players, and veterans like Bayer, who are talented in both virtue and art, are the idols of the vast majority of European audiences present.
In the first round of the morning match, Hook vs Bai Feng, Bai Feng took the lead right from the start and won the first game with a huge score of 11:3, shocking everyone. eyes, because in this game Bai Feng was playing strong against strong and attack against attack. He used his extremely powerful forehand loop and signature straight backhand to forcefully penetrate Hook's defense.
At that moment, fans all over the world even had a strange thought deep in their hearts. They speculated whether Hook had been cheated. Why, after going to Table Tennis Super League to play, not only could he not beat Luo Jiu, but he could not even beat Bai Feng?
Obviously in March this year China Open, Hook could still press Luo Jiu to the ground and rub it.
Could it be that Huaping knew that Hook would become a serious problem in the future, so he simply found a way to destroy Hook?
The fans soon discovered that they had thought too much.
Hook changed his playing style from the second game, and he became the unreasonable Hook again.
In fact, in Table Tennis Super League for more than a month, Hook has indeed changed subtly. In the process of practicing with Luo Jiu, he gradually absorbed many of the rigorous and delicate playing habits displayed by Luo Jiu, and incorporated them into In his own tactical system, he began to play more steadily, more rigorously, and with fewer flaws, so on Super League, his performance was actually quite good. He played nine rounds in more than a month, played a total of 15 times, and won all of them. This means that he has truly fundamentally solved the problem of his lack of stability.
What he learned at Table Tennis Super League is something he could never learn in a lifetime of playing in the German club league.
But in the process of making gains, Hook certainly encountered bottlenecks.
He cannot perfectly balance the relationship between "stable" and "fierce".
Especially when he found that no matter how fierce he was, he couldn't beat Luo Jiu, he subconsciously wanted to play more rigorously. He no longer had the confidence to attack Luo Jiu, but tried to limit Luo Jiu's offensive rhythm through more delicate playing methods.
In today's game, he subconsciously sought stability in the first game. Although it seemed to outsiders that he was still attacking the whole court, in fact, compared with his playing style back then, it was already somewhat gentle.
Just because he wasn't fierce enough, he was killed by Bai Feng.
But Hook is indeed very smart. He quickly realized that Bai Feng is not Luo Jiu. The reason why he was cautious about attacking Luo Jiu was because he couldn't defeat it, but Bai Feng... why should he let me endure it?
Hook started to go crazy in the second game, with full strength and speed. He continued to compete with Bai Feng with strength against strength and attack against attack. Bai Feng found that he seemed to be invincible.
At 11:3 in the second game, Hook responded with the same big score to Bai Feng.
In the third game, Bai Feng began to change his style, no longer fighting hard, choosing to combine offense and defense, and combining hardness and softness. This shows that Bai Feng is also using his brain. He is indeed not the Bai Feng of the past. When encountering difficulties, he will not be as stubborn as before. He chooses to fight in a roundabout way.
However, 8 minutes later, he was still defeated 7:11.
At this time, Bai Feng was relatively calm, because he had prepared for all this before the game. Facing a top player like Hook, he had already made the most difficult psychological preparation.
He held on tightly, trying to reverse the situation with willpower and stability.
Then in the fourth game, Bai Feng carried it all the way to 9:9. With great luck, he got the 10th point through a side ball. Then he successfully deceived Hook with a serve deception, reversed the game at 11:9, and chased the total score to 2:2.
In fact, we can also see the difference between non-Chinese associations players and Chinese table tennis players from here.
Non-Chinese associations players, no matter how hard they strive for stability, will still have subtle psychological fluctuations in key areas. After all, their usual training intensity is not enough, and they have reached the top of the competition too few times, so they have not yet developed the kind of mentality of being unfazed.
So even though Hook had been training at Table Tennis Super League for more than a month, after being slightly disturbed by a side ball, he still could not quickly complete the psychological adjustment. Otherwise, how could he be deceived by the fake serve?
But that's about it.
Although Hook couldn't adjust his state of mind in the short gap of a ball, he was able to adjust his state of mind during the rest time between games. Starting from the fifth game, he didn't give Bai Feng any chance. He won two consecutive games at 11:7 and 11:9, eliminated Bai Feng, and took the lead in reaching the top eight of Men's Singles.
This is not Bai Feng's fault, it is simply that his current comprehensive strength can no longer beat Hook.
He wanted to wait until Hook's form disappeared, but now Hook no longer loses his form inexplicably. He has gradually gained a bit of the charm of a Chinese player.
The second focus battle in the morning came from Morad and Fan Xiaodong.
Almost all European fans were expecting Morad to explode today, but they did not realize that when Old Wa said in the interview that "sometimes the experience of the game is more important than the victory or defeat", it had already vaguely foreshadowed the outcome of this game.
Old Wa has misunderstood some things, but overall it is quite accurate, especially Morad, which he taught himself, is very accurate.
In this game, Fan Xiaodong completed the crushing game 4:0 within 25 minutes.
This was also the fastest and most one-sided game among the four focus games this morning.
Facts have proved that there is no "battle between Asian supernovas and European supernovas", and this game is not at all "determining the direction of world table tennis in the next ten years" as boasted by the European media.
This is just a game of abuse.
Morad is indeed very strong and recognized by the world.
But Fan Xiaodong is indeed stronger, incredibly strong.
Morad has a very flexible playing style and is an IQ player. At the same time, because the racket and rubber are different from ordinary people, he has some very special hitting skills. He is famous for his weirdness and cleverness. He also believes that his non-mainstream playing style is more suitable for dealing with young players.
After all, the young general has little experience and is easily confused by dazzling appearances.
But Fan Xiaodong played this game too skillfully. No matter how Morad jumped, he simply swung short, rubbed long, and rushed with one hand.
It's that simple.
All of Mora's tricks were defeated by Fan Xiaodong's simple swing. As long as he gave him a little chance, Fan Xiaodong would kill him with one blow. If he couldn't be beaten, he would kill him with another one.
So we quickly entered the third focus battle today, Wang Chao vs Bayer.
This is a game that outsiders consider completely unpredictable.
It's not because veterans like Bayer will inevitably become popular in World Table Tennis Championships, but because even people within Huaping can't figure out what level Wang Chao is now.
Everyone can see that Wang Chao is getting better. Yesterday, he won the mixed doubles match between Kim Bong and Kim Jong 4:0, which shows that when he holds the superconductor racket, he no longer has many obvious loopholes that can be attacked.
But this is not enough, because the opponent is Bayer.
The combat effectiveness of veterans on World Table Tennis Championships is greatly increased.
A situation like Morad's direct defeat after being restrained never existed with Bayer.
If other players are looking for changes and opportunities in every round when they fall into a passive position, then veterans like Bayer will look for changes in the next ball after every ball falls into a passive state.
Their balls are much more complex than those of young people, and are full of all kinds of changes, not only because they have recorded a variety of tactics in their minds, but also because they have practiced a variety of techniques.
The game between Wang Chao and Bayer was very nice, but the scene looked a little weird because Wang Chao was almost on defense throughout the game.
At the beginning of the first game, Bayer actually didn't want to attack, because a veteran like him has already learned to use the most scientific way to conserve energy and avoid injuries in his many years of career, so he wanted to play defensive counterattack at the beginning.
However, Wang Chao does not attack.
Even when the opportunity looks good, he doesn't attack.
Bayer is not Hook, let alone Lin Zijun. He dare not directly feed the billiard ball to Wang Chao's forehand position. After all, he is old, and his speed and reflexes are not at their peak. If the ball is too comfortable and Wang Chao is fully activated, he is afraid that he will not be able to defend himself. Then it will not be a defensive counterattack, but a direct courtship.
In this situation, Bayer played very nervously. He was always waiting for Wang Chao to take the board, and he was always afraid that Wang Chao would take the board too hard. However, Wang Chao had an excellent touch. He was frightened in the short fight with Wang Chao, and was deeply afraid that he would accidentally get a spin.
So under the traction of this subtle energy, Bayer was finally forced to take the initiative to attack.
He attacks, Wang Chao defends.
This reminded many fans of the scene when Wang Chao beat Sissifield in the last round.
Wang Chao also defended the whole game against Sissifield, but the offensive styles of Sissifield and Bayer are completely different. The former is extremely powerful, extremely fast, and extremely spiny. Most of the attacks come from the backhand. Although the landing points are varied, the hitting point is relatively fixed.
Although the landing points are very scattered, because the hitting points are relatively unified, at least it is relatively simple for Wang Chao to judge Sissifield's offensive route. This allows him to move in advance in many cases, greatly reducing the difficulty of catching the ball.
Bayer is known as Little Sun Tianlong. Once he starts attacking, he will use all his tricks at once, such as forehand pull, backhand pull, forehand pick, backhand twist, forehand racket, head-up shot, drop shot, far angle, close angle, forehand fast, backhand tear, left top spin, right top spin, forward top spin, left spin, right spin...
It can be said that he can hit any offensive ball at any angle, any rotation, and any length.
At this time, it is really difficult to move ahead. Many times, you have to wait for him to hit the ball before you can react and then adapt accordingly.
Therefore, Wang Chao struggled to defend, which can be said to be embarrassing. He moved sideways, left and right, moved forward and backward, made various emergency stops, and changed directions. The sneakers under his feet rubbed against the professional rubber laid on the court, making a constant "squeaking" sound. Even so, he still missed a lot of balls like a colander.
After the first game, there were beads of sweat on both sides' foreheads. Bayer was tired because he was tired from attacking. Each ball had to be played for more than ten rounds. The opponent was like an unbeatable cockroach, always hanging on for a breath and refusing to die. This made him have to keep speeding up, constantly improving the rhythm, and constantly changing his landing point.
Wang Chao was tired because he ran too much. After playing a game, it was like running five thousand meters, and his calves were sore.
In this kind of war of attrition, Wang Chao lost the first game 7:11.
The second game was still the same. Bayer really hoped that Wang Chao could also attack, but Wang Chao just didn't attack. He tried to fight Wang Chao for a few rounds before giving up, and was forced to take the initiative to attack again.
In fact, it can be seen from here that Wang Chao's control of superconductors is already very subtle. The Bayer he faced is one of the five people with the best skills in the world, but he can still force Bayer to give up his shortcomings.
However, it is still difficult for him to cope with Bayer's pervasive offensive rhythm, which is full of veteran wisdom and various anti-human details.
In this game, Wang Chao still lost 6:11.
During the break between games, he was sitting on a chair panting heavily, munching on a banana and wiping away his sweat. He Jingping tried to suggest something behind him. "How about we win a game first, be stable, and then come back to practice?"
Wang Chao shook his head.
He Jingping will not be mentioned again.
He used to think that he knew Wang Chao well enough, but this time World Table Tennis Championships made him realize that in fact, he didn't know enough about Wang Chao.
As my disciple, when he was on the Table Tennis First Division field, he once asked Geng Shuai for help because he could not release his emotions. It can be seen that his mentality was not very good at that time.
But now his nerves were as hard as diamond.
When did he develop this mentality?
In fact, He Jingping really wanted to ask, "Are you really not afraid of being eliminated early?", but he refrained from asking.
Playing again after some repairs, Wang Chao got what he wanted and lost the third game with a score of 5:11 amidst the embarrassing defense.
Just looking at the score, he was playing worse and worse, becoming increasingly unable to defend against Bayer's attacks.
This is because Bayer has gradually gained feeling and confidence. With the shouts and cheers of European audiences from all directions, Bayer, a veteran in his 30s, vaguely remembered his surging enthusiasm and blood on the field more than ten years ago. He began to become younger, and the long-lost passion rose, giving him a little more strength out of thin air.
He hasn't played with such abandon for many years, but today, he once again reached the most intense peak of his career, playing the most gorgeous, complex, and entertaining all-out offensive game.
He was convinced that if Wang Chao continued to defend like this, it would be completely penetrated by him.
He also believed that even if Wang Chao changed his style of play in the fourth game, it would probably be too late.
Because he has firmly grasped the right time, location, and harmony, and now the general trend is beyond human power.
There is something called "power" in the field of competitive sports. Maybe Wang Chao does have a trump card, maybe Wang Chao's hard power is indeed better than his own, but because Wang Chao's laxity in the first three games has resulted in a "trend" being formed now. If Wang Chao wants to reverse it now, it would be to go against the trend, which may be much more difficult than Wang Chao expected.
It was also at this moment that Bayer, who had always maintained a calm mood in order to ensure the stability of the game, finally dared to let the little emotions hidden in his heart leak out a little.
He roared fiercely to the sky, with a sense of venting, and then his eyes filled with murderous intent.
Yes, he has emotions.
Of course he should have emotions.
An 18-year-old young player, who is familiar with the racket and practicing new techniques on the World Table Tennis Championships court, actually uses himself as a whetstone. This is actually a kind of humiliation.
If you are a novice, then there is nothing you can say about this kind of humiliation.
But I am European King, I am European Championships who has won seven consecutive championships, and I am a super strong person who once reached the second place in the world rankings.
Why do you dare to do this to me?
You can obviously attack, but you insist on leaving it to me. Where did you get the courage?
You obviously can't guard me, but you still insist on guarding me, over and over again, endlessly, endlessly, until you lose three games in a row.
Now that the overall situation has been decided and the momentum is established, do you really think you can prevent any miracle?
Bayer has faced too many games, and he has long understood a truth: in the field of competitive sports, there are no real miracles.
Those so-called comeback miracles that the world is familiar with and talk about are just laymen who don't understand the ball.
In the eyes of insiders, the outcome of many games is actually reasonable, but to outsiders, it is unexpected.
As for this game, in the eyes of an absolute expert like him, there was no possibility of reversal.
"Defense, after all, can't win."
"Only attack is the eternal theme of table tennis."
"Wang Chao, no matter how many unfulfilled dreams you have, please get out of this World Table Tennis Championships first!"