The Seamaster 2017 ITTF World Tour Platinum China Open that begins action today 22 June to 15 June 2017 promises to be a star-studded event with the world’s top table tennis players on show.
Less than a month after the conclusion of the Liebherr 2017 World Table Tennis Championships the world’s best table tennis stars are back in action on the Seamaster 2017 ITTF World Tour with all the top 5 Men’s & Women’s players in the world fighting for Gold in Chengdu China.
Reigning World & Olympic Champion MA Long (CHN) who just won his 24th World Tour Men’s Singles title last week at the LION Japan Open in Tokyo head the Men’s seeding followed by FAN Zhendong (CHN) XU Xin (CHN) ZHANG Jike (CHN) & Dimitrij OVTCHAROV (GER) who completes the top 5 names on the Men’s ranking.
The 2016 China Open champion FAN Zhendong will be eager to get revenge for his agonizing defeat in the World Championships final and also last week at the Japan Open.
In Women’s Singles world number one DING Ning (CHN) will be leading the charge for Gold trailing closely by LIU Shiwen (CHN) ZHU Yuling (CHN) Singapore’s FENG Tianwei as well as CHEN Meng (CHN) in the contest for the Women’s Singles crown.
The top 5 female stars will have to look out for SUN Yingsha (CHN) who shocked the world to claim the LION Japan Open title on her senior debut last week upsetting FENG & CHEN en route to making the unbelievable feat.
The unranked 16-year-old will be aiming to continue her amazing performance in Tokyo to cause some more shock results on home soil for a chance at another Gold medal.
Today sees some interesting matchups to put the China Open off to an exciting start. 41-year-old Vladimir SAMSONOV who holds the current record of most World Tour titles of 26 will face off 13-year-old Tomokazu HARIMOTO (JPN) who’s fresh from his World Championships streak of victories to reach quarterfinals on debut. It will sure be match not to miss to find out who will win in this clash of generations.
Fans can also expect more shocks & surprises in Chengdu which already saw China’s LIANG Jingkun & World Championships quarterfinalist LIN Gaoyuan (CHN) being shocked out of the tournament early in the qualifications by Chinese Taipei’s PENG Wang-Wei & LAM Sui Hang (HKG).
The 2017 China Open is the third platinum event of the Seamaster 2017 ITTF World Tour which features 12 events across the world in 2017 plus a World Tour Grand Finals which only the top 16 male and female players from the 12 World Tour events qualify for.
The events are split into two tiers Regular and Platinum. The six ITTF World Tour Platinum events will have higher prize money and be of a higher level organisation which will ensure the attendance of the world’s best players resulting in more international exposure for the hosts.
