(by Steve Hopkins) The 2021 calendar year ended with the US Open.  Usually, this event is the premier event in the country, but with the World Championships held in Houston just a few weeks earlier, this was not a typical year.  It seems we’ve had a lot of atypical events (and atypical years) of late – […]

(by Steve Hopkins) While the Open Singles events, the premiere events of the US Open Table Tennis Championships are just getting to the Quarterfinals, other events have concluded. Canada’s Simeon Martin won the U-21 Men’s Singles event.  Martin took advantage of a lucky draw (top seed, Vlialta Garcia fell in the group stage to Taran […]

(by Steve Hopkins) Borussia Dusseldorf swept past Werder Bremen today 3-0 to extend their record in the German League to 10-0.  They’ve been so dominant to this point that they have won 30 of the 35 individual matches and have only needed to extend beyond the singles into doubles on one occasion.  Today’s match saw […]

(by Steve Hopkins, Photo WTT) The first of a series of World Table Tennis Feeder Events concluded last Friday in Dusseldorf, Germany.  Two more are planned for January.  Feeder events are not intended to be for top tier players, but with cash prizes and ITTF ranking points, these events will help provide rising stars the […]

(by Steve Hopkins, Photo WTT) When the world’s best juniors came together in Vila Nova de Gaia, Portugal,  eight event titles were up for grabs.  The top two seeds in the U19 Boys Singles event were Germany’s Kay Stumper and Romania’s Darius Movileanu.  Both players fell early, Stumper lost to a strong Xiang Peng (China) […]

(by Steve Hopkins) Table Tennis Minnesota has three locations in the greater Minneapolis-St.Paul area.  The Training Center location is on Concord Street in South St. Paul, the Jewish Center location is on Cedar Lake Road in Minneapolis, and the Bloomington Armory location is in Bloomington.  Normally, the Training Center is open Monday-Thursday and Sunday and […]

(by Steve Hopkins) The top two performing teams in the Table Tennis Bundesliga (TTBL) with TTF Liebherr Ochsenhausen hosting first place Borussia Dusseldorf.  Both teams are incredibly strong, but the Dusseldorf squad is loaded (Timo Boll, Kallberg, Qiu, and Karlsson as their top four – Boll did not play today). The first match was Dang […]

(by Steve Hopkins) As we start the last month of the year, Fan Zhendong has cemented himself at the top of the rankings.  In fact, after winning the World Championships, Fan (at 12645) has a 2135 point lead over second place Ma Long and the separation between Ma Long (10510) and third place Xu Xin […]

(by Steve Hopkins) When was he last time THAT happened? When was the last time Fan Zhendong won a World Championship?  For a player who currently tops the ITTF rankings and who has seemingly won just about every title there is, it may be surprising that Sunday was the first Singles World Championship for Fan.  […]