On June 11, the ITTF 2024 Week 24 World Rankings were released, and Chinese table tennis team Smash veteran Ma Long suffered a penalty – because of his previous withdrawal from the WTT Chongqing Championships, there were zero points assigned to his eight men’s singles active points.
As the other two Chinese table tennis teams, Fan Zhendong (ranked fourth in the men’s singles last term) and Liang Jingkun (ranked third in the men’s singles last term), both participated in the WTT Chongqing Championships and added new points, the result was that Fan Zhendong’s latest ranking moved back to second, Liang Jingkun maintained his third place, and Ma Long, who had been ranked second in the previous ranking, dropped to fourth place, sparking a lot of controversy among fans.
Long before the current rankings came out, Ma Long’s abandonment of the WTT Chongqing Championships was already a talking point in the table tennis community, and the reason for that was that his withdrawal was a bit unconventional:
If it was because he was not feeling well, then why did Ma Long participate in the WTT Taiyuan regular season tournament after he made the decision to withdraw from the tournament? If it was something else, what was it? After all, we all knew that he would be given a 0 point for withdrawing from the tournament, and it was the last chance for Ma to participate in an international tournament before the Paris Olympics, so why did he waste it?
In the case of knowing that the withdrawal will be assigned 0 points, and there have been athletes who have suffered the penalty, Ma Long still turned away from the field, many fans can not help but guess: this is not the coaching team intentionally control the results of the score? There are two reasons –
First, according to the ITTF and the Olympic Committee’s rules, the qualification of the Paris Olympic Games singles competition will be given priority to the team’s world ranking of the top two athletes, and before Ma Long has been selected singles, but the ranking is higher than the selected Fan Zhendong; Second, Fan Zhendong’s recent poor condition, the coaching staff whether they want to change the ranking of the two by letting him participate, Ma Long withdrew from the game?
However, there are two loopholes in the above statement: first, the Olympic singles qualification is only given priority to the team’s top two players, may not be mandatory to them; second, if there is really the above provisions, then why the Chinese table tennis team men’s team will control the points of Ma Long, the women’s team does not control the points of Wang Manyu? Because the drop singles Wang Man Yu ranking is also higher than the selected Chen Meng, but did not appear in Chongqing withdrawal.
There is also an explanation that the veteran is trying to avoid injuries and other situations, so she only competed in the doubles of the less intense WTT Taiyuan regular season tournament, dropping out of the WTT Chongqing Championships singles (which only has a singles program), which may not be unreasonable.
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