On December 21, 2021, the International Table Tennis Federation officially announced part of the participation list of the "WTT Macau Champions 2021 China Star", which surprised countless fans that ma Long, Xu Xin and Liu Shiwen, who have been away from the field for a long time, are on the list, which also makes countless fans who think they are about to retire happy: finally wait!
In addition, Liu Guoliang and the national table tennis coaching team will send almost all the main players to participate, including Fan Zhendong, Chen Meng, Sun Yingsha, Wang Manyu, Wang Chuqin, Liang Jingkun and others, but because the time of the event and the Japanese National Championship is too close, we are likely to not see the national table tennis and Zhang Benzhihe, Ito Mimachi and others staged a "Sino-Japanese showdown".
The WTT Macau Champions 2021 China Star is an important event in 2022, scheduled for January 19-23. Prior to this, the last foreign battle in which the main players of the national table tennis participated was the WTT World Cup final (held in Singapore) that ended on December 7, and then everyone has been in quarantine since they returned home, and they have not yet "exited".
For Ma Long, Xu Xin, Liu Shiwen, their recuperation time is longer - since the end of the National Games and the Table Tennis Super League, these three people have taken the initiative to give up the competition of the World Table Tennis Championships and the WTT World Cup, and entered a semi-retired state, which has been more than two months, and now they are finally going to re-emerge from the jianghu, how can they not make fans and friends feel excited?
According to the information disclosed by the Table Tennis Federation, in addition to the national table tennis players, the "WTT Macau Championship 2021 China Star" will also have Hong Kong celebrities Du Kaixuan and He Junjie, the Netherlands player Li Jie, the Polish player Li Qian, macao local athletes Zhang Zicheng and Zhang Zijun joined, but for the time being, the names of other foreign association masters such as Zhang Benzhihe, Ito Mimachi, Bohr, Ocharov and other foreign association masters have not been seen.
Judging from the list released so far, the Macau Tournament seems to be mainly aimed at Chinese athletes and overseas Chinese players; and from the perspective of time, the Macau Tournament is also somewhat close to the National Championship in Japan (held from January 24 to 30), so this time it should be no chance to stage a Sino-Japanese showdown.
But it doesn't matter, the full main lineup of national table tennis is enough to represent the highest level of world table tennis, so even if there is no Japan and other foreign association masters to participate, this Macau tournament is enough to become a very high-level competition, and finally hope that Ma Long, Xu Xin, Liu Shiwen can play their own prestige again, and also look forward to the young players can bloom new brilliance: come on, guys!