LIEBHERR Men��s World Cup - Paris

O! Ju Qian wrote: Wang Liqin looked like he gave the game away to ma lin.  He didn't look like he was complaining too much about his mistakes during his match against ma lin.  i think he does not care who wins, just as long as one of the chinese players win the final.  he played more serious against chuan than ma.  i guess is their chinese way of dealing things.  someone has to win the final right?  i have to admit that ma lin's forehand became faster just as wang hao's rpb got better.  if you watch wang liqin's game against chuan, you will notice that he has been improving his backhand and is trying to become more balance from both wings.

 

Thats true, But I really can't see someone who has played Ma so much just suddenly giving this match away. I'm sure he would like a chinese to win but Wang is chinese, why wouldn't he want it haha.  And also I thought pro's still had coaches...Wang didn't....I'm not sure if Ma did or not but I'm positive Wang didn't?

its seems that you dont have the 1st stage    .

right ?????

the reason wang wasnt complaining about errors was because he was playing a country mate and he wishes to be courteous, two countrymates also tend not to "cho" too often either

opinari wrote: I admit it does seem fishy, but in the interview with Wang after the match, he sounds pretty honest about the loss. He blames bad serve/receive technique, but expressly says he's happy that it's an all Chinese final. If you wanted to dump the match, why would you dump it 4-0? And would you advertise the fact that you're happy for the rest of the team? Maybe the simplest explanation is true? He lost the match.

what else can he say, opinari?? "i'm so pissed that coach liu ordered me to dump that game just so ma can get to no. 2 in the world and win a record 4th world cup!! and i really hope wang hao disobeys orders and beats the crap out that little bugger cuz he sure doesn't deserve it!!"

dumping matches is illegal, so wang (or any other player) isn't gonna say anything which would tip the officials off to what he did. nothing but negative consequences would come to him if he did...

4-0... maybe he (or they) didn't want to extend ma for too long and risk an injury. for those of you who watched the final you might have noticed ma occasionally reaching for his back after being stretched out in a rally. he may have a back problem...

or maybe wang was saying, "well, since i gotta lose anyway, why make it last any longer than what it has to??"

yes, i know, it's just speculation on my part, but i don't think it's a total impossibility. at any rate, it doesn't matter if you lose 4-0 or 4-3, it's still a loss.

another consideration would be that if wang liqin won that match and then samsonov pulled off a miracle and beat wang hao, then he might be so pumped up he might upset wang liqin in the final, which is exactly what he did in the world cup 5 years ago. wang liqin actually was actually undefeated in ittf "ranking" events for 1 whole damn year until that loss to samsonov!

and i think the 3rd place match confirmed that possibility, cuz wang just barely beat samsonov, 4-3. samsonov basically lost the match due to some untimely errors in the 3rd game when he had set point, i believe.

anyway, it was quite fortuitous for the chinese team that samsonov took out boll and then lost to the 2 wangs.

wlq will probably stay at no. 1 for the rest of the year and ma will probably move up to no. 2. and wang hao will move closer to boll.

the chinese top-4 will not be playing in anymore pro tour events until the finals in december. boll, on the other hand, will play 2 events before then. if he can win, he may be able to get himself back into the no. 2 spot.

a friend of mine had an interesting quip about boll after the loss. he said that boll has been so obsessed with learning how to beat the chinese (especially wlq) that he's forgotten how to beat the europeans! last month, in the champions league, he lost to his doubles partner, christian suess!! and now he loses to 2 guys he generally beats, kreanga and samsonov. although samsonov beats him sometimes, he shouldn't have lost to kreanga.

someone above said that wang hao was the best player at the tournament and i totally agree. he would have won had he not, well, you know what i'm gonna say...

how has missing "so many tournaments" hurt their ranking??

Can anyone upload that Samsonov-Liqin match? Plz

Great matches! Ma Lin at the top of his game. The most difficult way to win is to absorb your opponent's offense and then counter with power. Ma lost to Liu in the World Championship trying.
The key for the attacker is to keep increasing the intensity of the attacks and not let the defender comes back with any sort of attacks. Liu was smart and knew this but Wang Hao was not. In the third game and fourth game Hao must force his attacks using all of his reserve energy or else he is finished, and he didn't push himself. He was still soft and not ready for the victory. When Ma step up Wang should have too!
To hear that Ma, someone who won the cup three time, was winning because someone was throwing the game is too funny. I was in tears!
I wonder if we all were watching the same match! Where are the instances when someone missing on purpose or someone aiming to hit the ball out?
Ma play Wang LQ much better recently because of better tactics and good form. You now don't see Ma engaging in so much short pushes and blocks when he play WLQ. He plays like when he is younger and runs more to play the forehand instead of standing close to the table and waits for something to happen. A good lesson for the rest of us!

takaaki wrote: besides, if you don't care about the ranking (or the money, or the titles, for that matter), then why play at all??

Play for glory, for the sport of table tennis. $ is less important, and ranking is even less important if at all. I guess you are wondering why those Koreans quit this year's world cup, right? How come they didn't care $? Tell you what, they are preparing for the upcoming Asian Games, they care more about the glory they can bring to their country.

If ranking and $ are more important, the 3 Chinese players would have passed the Chinese National Games last year, which was totally unprofitable, and then they would be better prepared for last year's World Cup, which concerned $ and ranking.

This also answers your another question. Playing more tours definately means getting more $, doesn't it? also playing more tours helps one's ranking. It is that simple, for example, since we are talking about Ma Lin here, have a look at Ma Lin's this year's tour record, how many tours he took, and how many he won? Being in such good form, he can easily take more tour titles if he really wants.

What is the most important for Ma Lin is, of course, the title of World Champion and Olympic single title, for the glory, not for the money. Ranking is not important at all.

stanleyhu is there any way to get some qualification videos? it's impossible for me to get a video of liu song. if someone has one please give me the link in order i can download it thanks a lot

First of all, welcome your thankyous. But these are the only videos I got. Hopefully someone may have other matches and post here.

surler wrote: takaaki wrote: besides, if you don't care about the ranking (or the money, or the titles, for that matter), then why play at all?? Play for glory, for the sport of table tennis. $ is less important, and ranking is even less important if at all. I guess you are wondering why those Koreans quit this year's world cup, right? How come they didn't care $? Tell you what, they are preparing for the upcoming Asian Games, they care more about the glory they can bring to their country. If ranking and $ are more important, the 3 Chinese players would have passed the Chinese National Games last year, which was totally unprofitable, and then they would be better prepared for last year's World Cup, which concerned $ and ranking. This also answers your another question. Playing more tours definately means getting more $, doesn't it? also playing more tours helps one's ranking. It is that simple, for example, since we are talking about Ma Lin here, have a look at Ma Lin's this year's tour record, how many tours he took, and how many he won? Being in such good form, he can easily take more tour titles if he really wants. What is the most important for Ma Lin is, of course, the title of World Champion and Olympic single title, for the glory, not for the money. Ranking is not important at all.

 

glory??

how is the world ranking separate from "glory?"

is it more "glorious" for china (or any country) to say "our top 3 players are ranked 301, 302 and 303 in the world" or would it sound better be able to say "we're 1, 2, and 3 in the world???"

you and i both know the answer to that question!!  just take a look a the topics of this forum--how often do we discuss american or canadian players as opposed to european or asian players??  how many requests do we see for videos for the one as compared to the other??

besides, if you had some national pride, how proud would you feel for your team if they were the latter or the former??

anyway, how many titles is no. 302 in the world gonna win??  how much "glory" are they gonna get for their country??  how much money are they gonna get??

as for the top chinese playing more matches, who's to say they would win more titles??  i believe they are already physically challenged as it is with the schedule they are on now.  wang hao was wearing a knee brace last month; wlq looks tired and ma lin, i believe, has a back problem. 

you can't play every match there is to play--there's too many and they already play too much as it is...

they're not gonna play these last few pro tour events, but then they're going to doha to play the asian games and which end on dec. 15th and then they come back to china to play the pro tour grand finals which start the 14th.  how they're gonna swing that??  i dunno...

then there's the olympics in 2008.  it doesn't make a whole lotta sense to play them a whole lot now if you want them to perform well then...  that would fit into your "glory" theory...

besides, you and i have diametrically opposed assumptions built into our arguments.  you assume the the players decide for themselves which events they will play.

i say the team "brass" decides everything.  those players over there are probably the most tightly controlled players in the world.  that whole deal with chen qi back in the spring, or with qui yike back in feb. or with ma lin and bai yang a few years back confirms this.  i don't think they can go to the john to lay a crap without asking permission first.

also, look at the head-to-head between ma lin and wang liqin.  it's just too predictable to be simple chance.

so, that's why i say wlq threw that sf game to ma and then wang h. threw the final.    the only surprise for me was that the final score was 4-3.  but i think ma just threw the 6th game just to make it look respectable.  and then wang h. threw the last one...

yeah, i know, most of you guys are gonna disagree, but i don't care, cuz i think it's obvious.  so, i guess we'll just have to "agree to disagree."  that's all, folks...

Would it be possible to post Boll's losing matches? Thanks.

I think Wang did gave the match to Ma. There're 1 clear point I've watch in slow motion,, Wang serves long, Ma loops cross the table to the right and instantly go to pick up his towel while Wang without effort still reaching the ball. Seems like Wang wanna pay for the 2005 world championship final. Under strategic team perspective, Ma has more chance to beat Samsonov (if have to) than Wang.

boll gave away his matches to kreanga and samsanov in his effort to push his fellow euro mate. lol

d lol ghost

mcuba wrote: boll gave away his matches to kreanga

did you see the match to say that ? Kreanga played better than Boll and Kreanga were lucky, that's all