Recently, behind the increasingly fierce competition for the women's team Olympic selection spots, there has also been a distribution of internal interests. With Li Sun personally intervening to change the Olympic selection rules and rejecting Wang Yidi, the internal contradictions of the national women's table tennis team seem to have surfaced. In the eyes of fans, Li Sun's official announcement that Wang Yidi was not selected is most embarrassing for Ma Lin.
In the view of the outside world, the internal contradictions of the national women's table tennis team have reached a point where head coach Li Sun must speak out.
During the Paris Olympic cycle, Ma Lin's selection decisions have sparked extensive discussions and controversies, especially regarding the huge controversy over "who to use between Wang Manyu and Wang Yidi," which has also led to dissatisfaction among fans and netizens.
As we all know, Ma Lin attached great importance to Wang Yidi during the Paris Olympic cycle and sent her to participate in major events many times. However, Wang Yidi's record was losing seven external matches, including losing to 61-year-old Ni Xiaolian, as well as five losses to Japanese table tennis players.
On the contrary, Wang Manyu has never lost to Japanese female table tennis players and remains undefeated to this day. It can be said that Japanese female table tennis players are intimidated by Wang Manyu. So why did Ma Lin insist on not sending Wang Manyu to compete against Japan in the final of the Busan team event?
The head coach of the national table tennis team, Li Sun, publicly announced the decision to exclude Wang Yidi from the Olympic singles event, which is actually most embarrassing and humiliating for Ma Lin, as it directly negates Ma Lin's personnel achievements over the past three years.
Li Sun chose a decisive approach, directly negating that Wang Yidi is no longer suitable to continue participating in the Olympic singles competition. This may be the most ruthless personnel decision in the history of the national table tennis team.
There is a long-term teacher-student relationship between Ma Lin and Wang Yidi, and Ma Lin also has obvious appreciation and heavy reliance on Wang Yidi.
During Ma Lin's tenure as the head coach, Wang Yidi was one of the players he was responsible for guiding. This relationship began during a critical period of Wang Yidi's career, and over time, Ma Lin's trust and support for Wang Yidi continued. When Ma Lin became the head of the national women's table tennis team, this trust and support did not change, and he gave Wang Yidi important game opportunities on multiple occasions.
For example, when Wang Yidi lost to Hina Hayata at the World Table Tennis Championships, Ma Lin still insisted on letting her participate in the Asian Games, which shows that Ma Lin holds a positive attitude towards Wang Yidi's abilities and is willing to give her more opportunities to prove herself.
In the eyes of fans, Ma Lin and Wang Yidi are both from Liaoning, and their relationship goes beyond that of an ordinary coach and player. Ma Lin's favor and support have played an important role in Wang Yidi's career, and even images of the two drinking famous wine with the Liaoning team were exposed.
In fact, whether Ma Lin celebrated Wang Yidi's success with Moutai or not is not important. What is important is that, judging from the current situation, the internal contradictions of the women's table tennis team seem to have a semi-public trend. There are only two singles spots for the Paris Olympics, but the three years of focusing on Wang Yidi have been completely rejected by head coach Li Sun. The remaining few months will be a choice between Chen Meng and Wang Manyu.
The only suggestion from fans is that whoever the coaching staff decides to use, whether it's Wang Manyu or Chen Meng, they must be given a fair chance to compete. Only then can the Olympic selection of the national women's table tennis team convince the outside world.
