China's mighty paddlers led the field in the first round of the
2007 World Table Tennis Championships in Zagreb yesterday, notching
up ten 4-0 wins.
The Chinese proved simply too strong for their opponents, the
whole team combining to lose only two sets in the first round of
five events.
Ma Lin, a veteran of six World Championship finals (including
four wins), dropped one set against Polish athlete Wang Zengyi
before taking the match in the men's singles
tournament.??
The other set was dropped by Yao Yan and Xu Xin who saw off
India's? Achanta and Poulomi Ghatak 3-1.
The rest of the team all enjoyed whitewashes with Olympic hope
Ma Long wiping out Russian Kirill Skachkov 4-0 to reach the second
round.
In the women's singles, China's world No.1 Zhang Yining routed
Ng Sock Khim of Malaysia 4-0 while Hong Kong showed the mainland
they are no slouches with Tie Yana destroying US athlete and Yao Xi
Huang in straight sets.
China's top doubles players didn't need to break a sweat either
with Chen Qi/Ma Lin and Wang Hao/Wang Liqin romping into the second
round in straight sets. The women soon joined them with Wang
Nan/Zhang Yining and Guo Yue/Li Xiaoxia keeping a clean sheet in
the women's doubles.
Finally, top-seeded Guo Yue/Wang Liqin took their mixed doubles
opener 4-0.
"We had been ready for a difficult day since the first round is
usually tough," said the Chinese coach Liu Guoliang. "As it turns
out, we were fine."
Austria's 2003 world singles champion Werner Schlager fell prey
to age since he collapsed in both the singles and doubles openers
while another big name, Alexei Smirnov of Russia, succumbed in the
first round to Nigeria's Segun Toriola.
(Xinhua News Agency May 23, 2007)