(by Steve Hopkins, photo WTT)
By the time we reached the final Sunday matches at the WTT Champions Chongqing, the highest remaining seed was Tomokazu Harimoto (World No. 5). Like the three higher seeds in the event, Harimoto fell via upset – losing 4-2 to Wen Ruibo. For his part, Ruibo was the only Chinese player to reach the Final Four despite there being five Chinese players seeded ahead of him. For what its worth, Ruibo isn’t a “normal” World No. 27, as this win sent him into his third WTT Finals – and when the next rankings are released he will be securely in the Top 20.
The other Semifinal featured a pair of teenagers with Sora Matsushima jumping out to a 3-1 lead over Felix Lebrun before losing three straight. Lebrun’s 4-3 comeback launched him into the Final where he would face off against Ruibo. Comparing the unlikely runs of the two players is an interesting exercise. For Lebrun, he dominated two potentially tough opponents – 3-0 wins against both Quadri Aruna and An Jaehyun. Lebrun then upset Hugo Calderano – a comeback win the necessitated 3 straight wins to close out the match. Lebrun would have then had to face World No. 1 Wang Chuqin, except that Matsushima upset Chuqin a round earlier. Still, Matsushima was on an amazing run, and Lebrun again found himself down 1-3 and again executed three straight wins to come from behind and advance 4-3. Ruibo’s run was event more unexpected – a win over another young star (3-0 win over Flavien Coton). Ruibo then upset Truls Moregard 3-1, then Dang Qiu 4-2, and then Harimoto 4-2.
The Final turned out to be far less dramatic than the tight Semifinal matches and all of the upsets of the Quarterfinals round. Felix Lebrun won the first two games handily. Ruibo then won one game. Lebrun pulled away in the fourth game and then won a tight fifth game for a 4-1 victory. Felix Lebrun wins in Chongqing.
For China, the result is disappointing. They had 7 competitors in the Round of 32, 4 reached the Round of 16, 2 reached the final 8, and only Ruibo went further. Japan outperformed expectations overall – with 3 of 4 entrants winning their first match and two reaching the Semifinals. And for France, of their four entrants only Felix Lebrun won a match – of course, he won ALL of his matches, so their consolation is that the tournament trophy is heading home with their team today.
On the women’s side, it was Kuai Man against Wang Yidi in one all-Chinese Semi, and in the other half of the draw it was Miwa Harimoto and Satsuki Odo in an all-Japanese Semi. All of the top four seeds had lost in upsets, but on Sunday – the higher seeds won both the Semifinals. This left Kuai Man (World no. 5) and Miwa Harimoto (World No. 8) advancing to the Final. Harimoto won the first game, Kuai Man fired back with two in a row, Harimoto won two in a row to take the lead again, and the two traded the final two games. Miwa Harimoto wins – with sufficient points to move her up in the rankings to No. 5 (maybe even No. 4).
Visit ButterflyOnline.com for the latest table tennis news and results.
