(by Steve Hopkins/Photo by ITTF) With the whole sports world shut down, there is very little activity to report.  However, there were a few tournaments early March which have caused some changes in the April Rankings. The biggest news is that Fan Zhendong has retaken the top spot.  Xu Xin has dropped one position to […]

World Rankings for March:  Largely Stable at the Top (by Steve Hopkins/Photo by ITTF) The March rankings are out, and the Top 10 lists are largely stable.  Xu Xin maintains his narrow lead over Fan Zhendong (a 345 point margin that amounts to approximately a 2% lead in total points).  Ma Long is third, and Lin Gaoyuan is […]

(by Steve Hopkins) China holds on to the top four spots, with Xu Xin, Fan Zhendong, Ma Long, and Lin Gaoyuan each holding their spots.  The point separation between Xu Xin and Fan Zhendong is narrowing, so September could be a month to watch the top spot. The rest of the Top 10 are Harimoto, […]

(by Steve Hopkins/Photo by ITTF) Without much movement in the rankings thus far in 2019, events so far in April should cause some real movement in May.   At this point, however, the rankings are holding with very little change.  The top 5 players are unchanged.  Sangsu Lee and Hugo Calderaono (now Nos. 6/7) swapped places from […]

(by Steve Hopkins) Perhaps the most notable fact about the ITTF World Rankings lists for March is that this is the first time since the new rankings process was instituted that no one in the Top 10 changed positions.  That new process has an emphasis on participation and was designed to create more movement – […]

(by Steve Hopkins) With hype building in the United States for the Super Bowl this weekend, the ITTF published an article about table tennis viewership in China.  For the biggest event of our biggest sport, Nielsen ratings generally show about a 43% viewership number (103 million viewers) – meaning almost half of the TVs on […]

ITTF Rankings: Fan, Xu, Harimoto Top the First 2019 Rankings (by Steve Hopkins) Fan Zhendong and Xu Xin maintained their top two spots in the January 2019 ITTF World Rankings.  Tomakazu Harimoto has jumped up to third, riding the strength of his Grand Finals win in December.  Lin Gaoyuan and Timo Boll round out the […]