China’s ZHU Yuling is the newly crowned Champion of the Uncle Pop 2017 ITTF Women’s World Cup presented by Polar Naturals held in Markham Canada from 27 – 29 October 2017. The top seed claimed her career first ITTF Women’s World Cup title in a grueling 7-games thriller and in turn stopping her teammate LIU Shiwen’s hope of a record fifth title.
In the nail biting final that thrilled the capacity crowd at the Markham Pan Am Centre ZHU had to recover from 0-2 down and a controversial edge ball that costed her a crucial fifth game 10-12 against LIU. Determined for the title the 22-year-old was on all pumped to against her more experienced colleague and eventually winning the last two games to take the match 4-3 (11-13 8-11 11-7 11-8 10-12 11-9 12-10) & win the prestigious title.
“I’m still very nervous now even after winning!” shared ZHU after her epic victory. “In the match because I was too nervous I made some errors. Now I’m really happy to win the title!”
It’s double joy for the newly crowned Champions she has now also earned enough world ranking points to overtake reigning World Champion DING Ning (CHN) to become the next World Number One in the next month’s ITTF World Rankings.
Finalists in Philadelphia last year defending champion Miu HIRANO (JPN) and CHENG I-Ching (TPE) had to fight for the bronze medal after being knocked out of the race for Gold by LIU & ZHU respectively in the semifinals.
It was CHENG who took the victory in hand and avenged for the 2016 loss to HIRANO winning 4-2 (9-11 11-5 9-11 11-9 11-5 11-8) to take home the bronze medal.
With the conclusion of the Uncle Pop 2017 ITTF Women’s World Cup presented by Polar Naturals the world’s best athletes will head off to Magdeburg Germany for the upcoming Seamaster 2017 ITTF World Tour Platinum German Open.
