SINGAPORE – From being a reserve in China’s Olympic desk tennis staff, world No. 4 Wang Manyu is now a world champion after she beat compatriot and world No. 2 Solar Yingsha 4-2 (11-13, 11-7, 6-11, 11-6, 11-8, 17-15) within the 2021 World Desk Tennis Championships Finals on Monday (Nov 29) in Houston, Texas.
That is Wang’s maiden world championships crown and on her solution to the ultimate, the 22-year-old avenged her 2019 semi-final loss to world No. 1 Chen Meng with a hardfought 4-3 win on this yr’s semi-final.
Wang was named the reserve for China’s staff on the Tokyo Olympics and finally helped her staff win their fourth consecutive gold after she changed the injured Liu Shiwen.
In Texas on Monday, Solar rapidly gained a 3-0 lead within the first sport however Wang rallied to go forward 10-6. However she was unable to transform any of her 5 sport factors and Solar solely wanted one to take the primary sport 13-11.
The second sport additionally noticed Wang come from behind to guide 10-6 after a couple of unforced errors from Solar and this time, Wang made her benefit depend, taking the second sport 11-7.
Solar stored her cool to win the third sport 11-6 however a resurgent Wang got here again to win the subsequent two video games to guide 3-2 general, needing only one sport to be topped world champion.
The final sport noticed lengthy rallies and a decent battle between the ladies’s doubles world champions however finally, two unforced errors from Solar noticed Wang topped world champion for the primary time.
Within the post-match court-side interview, Wang stated she can be celebrating by reviewing the match to see how she will be able to enhance in future video games.
She added: “I’m actually excited and joyful now. I do not assume there is a loser in tonight’s ultimate. We’re the identical age and we’re good opponents, good mates. We encourage one another to do our greatest so I need to give because of Sha-sha and all of the followers that help us.”
Olympic singles silver medallist Solar, 21, stated: “Firstly, I am very happy that I made it to the finals in all three occasions I participated in. I give my congratulations to Manyu, she did an excellent job tonight.
“We’re very conversant in one another and I made some errors tonight however I am nonetheless very joyful.”
Earlier within the competitors, Wang and Solar retained their ladies’s doubles gold medal after beating Japanese duo Mima Ito and Hina Hayata. Solar additionally added the blended doubles gold to her haul this yr after she and Wang Chuqin defeated Japanese Tomokazu Harimoto and Hayata.
In the meantime within the males’s singles ultimate, a brand new champion was additionally topped as Chinese language world No. 1 Fan Zhendong comfortably beat Swedish teenager Truls Moregard 4-0 (11-6, 11-9, 11-7, 11-8).
That is Fan’s fourth world championships outing, together with his earlier finest outcome being runner-up in 2017. He received the joint bronze in 2015 and was knocked out within the spherical of 16 in 2019.
Tokyo Olympics singles silver medallist Fan, 24, was ecstatic concerning the outcome, including: “Really earlier than the sport, I used to be actually nervous as a result of it is not nearly my very own objectives, I must take duty (for the staff) and I needed to win this honour for our staff and I did it.
“Each sport is like an journey to me, so this ultimate sport isn’t the ultimate level for me and I hope I can be taught quite a bit from this sport and proceed my profession and develop myself.”
Whereas world No. 77 Moregard was disenchanted to lose the ultimate, he was joyful that he made it this far within the competitors.
The 19-year-old stated: “He is a significantly better participant, he is world No. 1 for a cause and it was a troublesome match.”