Beijing Time, January 10th, 2025: The second day of the WTT Star Challenge Doha Station has concluded, and the performance of the Japanese table tennis team on this match day can be described as catastrophic! In the night games, the women's singles world champion within the Japanese team, Miyu Hino, suffered a 0-3 defeat at the hands of Chinese player Xunrui Shi. Meanwhile, Mehe Zhang experienced a major upset with a 2-3 loss against Thai player Paran, and last year's Montpellier Championship women's singles champion, Satsuki Todo, also lost 2-3 to Chinese player Kuai Man! In stark contrast to the Japanese team is our national team, who not only excelled in the singles competition by defeating strong opponents but also advanced to three finals in the doubles events that have already been decided!
During the early matches of the second match day, several upsets had already occurred, such as the eliminations of Fancisca and Jonghyun Lim.
Unexpectedly, the night games continued to produce upsets, particularly focused on the Japanese women's team. The biggest upset was Mehe Zhang's exit, who faced Thai player Paran and was twice ahead in the total score at 1-0 and 2-1 but was tragically reversed. In the last two sets, Zhang made too many mistakes herself, ultimately losing 2-3 to Paran. The detailed scores for the five sets (Zhang in front): 11-7, 9-11, 11-7, 4-11, 7-11.
Miyu Hino lost three consecutive sets with scores of 4-11, 8-11, and 8-11, suffering a crushing 0-3 defeat to the lower-ranked Chinese player Xunrui Shi, which was quite surprising. Perhaps everyone thought that Miyu Hino might lose, but most certainly did not expect her to lose in such a crushing manner.
Furthermore, Satsuki Todo, who has been on a strong upward trend in the Japanese team, also lost to Chinese player Kuai Man in the 1/16 finals. The scores for the five sets (Kuai in front): 11-9, 7-11, 11-7, 8-11, 11-5. Kuai led twice, Todo leveled twice, and Kuai won the decisive set.
On the Chinese team's side, in addition to continuously defeating the main players of the Japanese team in the singles arena, they also advanced to the finals in the doubles arena, with three doubles finals already decided, all featuring Chinese pairs.
The specific matchups for the three doubles finals are as follows:
Mixed Doubles: Youzheng Huang / Xunrui Shi - Kakeru Matsumoto / Mehe Zhang
Men's Doubles: Peng Xiang / Yingbin Xu - Tomokazu Harimoto / Kakeru Matsumoto
Women's Doubles: Zhuojia He / Gege Man - Satsuki Todo / Sakura Yokoi