Second day of WTT: more eliminations narrow the path into the Round of 16
The World Table Tennis (WTT) Champions Macao 2023 tournament, which started on Monday, continued yesterday with the second day of the Round of 32.
In the men’s group, the day started with extremely competitive matches, all of which were decided in the last set.
Nonetheless, Lin Yun-Ju, Anton Kallberg, and Dimitrij Ovtcharov all vanquished their opponents Shunsuke Togami, Qiu Dang, and Lim Jonghoon, 3:2.
The victory of Swedish Mattias Falck over the German Benedikt Duda came a little easier, with Falck winning 3:1.
Later in the evening, the Chinese athletes took to the stage at the infinity arena at Tap Seac Multisports Pavilion with Lin Shidong (China) taking on Tomokazu Harimoto (Japan) as well as the most anticipated debut of the public favorite, Ma Long (China), who faced the Nigerian Quadri Aruna. The day closed with the men’s group with the match between Andrej Gaćina (Croatia) and Wang Chuqin (China).
In the women’s group, the Chinese Chen Xingtong was eliminated at the hands of the Romanian Bernadette Szocs in a 3:1 defeat, and the Korean Jeon Jihee beat the Brazilian Bruna Takahashi by the minimum margin (3:2).
In the last matches of the evening, Qian Tianyi (China) faced Miyuu Kihara (Japan), and Chen Meng (China) battled with Hong Kong’s Doo Hoi Kem.
The first part of the tournament program today is still dedicated to the final encounters of the Round of 32, with the first matches of the Round of 16 to follow later in the day.
