(by Steve Hopkins)

The 2025 ITTF World Table Tennis Championships are set to take place in Doha, Qatar, from May 17–25, bringing 128 of the World’s best players to one of the sports’ largest stages.  The Lusail Sports Arena will serve as the primary venue, an arena built for the 2022 FIFA World Cup with seating for over 15,000.

This year’s tournament features a stacked lineup, with China’s Lin Shidong and Wang Chuqin as the top two seeds.  With 2025 World Cup winner, Hugo Calderano as the third seed, and former WTT Tour Grand Final Champion Tomokazu Harimoto as the fourth seed.  US fans will be able to cheer on Kanak Jha, Nandan Naresh, Sid Naresh, and Jishan Liang.

The draw for the event was released this week, and while we’d expect to see the top seeds advance, there are some interesting matchups to watch.  Benedikt Duda may have a tight match with Alberto Mino.  Ovidiu Ionescu has drawn dangerous Iranian Noshad Alamiyan.  Xue Fei will face off against Hiroto Shinozuka (with two hard-hitting and exciting, though sometimes inconsistent players against each other).  USA’s Kanak Jha will face Brazil’s Guilherme Teodoro. USA’s Jishan Liang will have a tough match against Lin Yun-Ju.  And even tougher, USA’s Nandan Naresh has World No. 2 Wang Chuqin.  Puerto Rico’s Brian Afanador will face Hwan Bae.

Looking out further, its possible that we’ll see Round of 16 action that would match Lin Shidong against Anton Kallberg, or Liang Jingkun against Dang Qiu, or the Lebrun brothers each facing the other, or Harimoto against Jorgic, or Lin Gaoyuan versus Wang Chuqin.  Lots of great action to look forward to in about two weeks.

Stay tuned for match updates and analysis as the tournament unfolds.

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