World Table Tennis
The wait for the first official World Table Tennis (WTT) events is over with the WTT Middle East Hub underway at the Lusail Sports Arena in Doha in Doha, Qatar. A total of 298 players are taking part at the events, representing 66 countries, as the sport returns in style on the international stage.
The Hub features two tiers of the new WTT event structure, with players competing in a WTT Contender event before moving on to a WTT Star Contender event the following week:
WTT Contender qualifying draw: 28 February – 2 March
Main draw: 3 – 6 March
WTT Star Contender qualifying draw: 6 – 7 March
Main draw: 8 – 13 March
The WTT Contender Series has been designed to provide the perfect setting for some of the world’s leading stars to be challenged by the best up-and-coming athletes in table tennis.
The WTT Contender event has commenced with a three-day qualifying draw. 91 players start their journey in the men’s singles draw, with a further 76 in the women’s singles. They will battle it out to be amongst the 8 players to progress to the main draw.
Adding spice to the proceedings, these 8 players will be selected at random into the main draw, that is held between 3 – 6 March, starting with a round of 32 in both men’s and women’s singles events.
The qualifying draw also features 32 mixed doubles pairs, who are vying for 8 spots in the main draw, that will be contested from the round of 16 across mixed doubles, men’s doubles and women’s doubles formats.
Qualifying draws have never been more competitive, with a mouth-watering array of talent from all corners of the world ready to enter the action in Doha.
In the men’s singles, Omar Assar (Egypt) is among the favourites to progress to the main draw. A regular champion on African soil, he is the top seed in the qualifying rounds.
There is plenty of strength and experience on show from Europe with the likes of Ruwen Filus (Germany), Jon Persson (Sweden), Daniel Habesohn (Austria) and Andrej Gacina (Croatia), all looking to make it to the next stage.
They will be put to the test by a younger generation of ambitious talent, such as Kirill Gerassimenko (Kazakhstan) Anton Kallberg (Sweden), Vitor Ishiy (Brazil) and Horacio Cifuentes (Argentina), to name but a few.
In the women’s singles, close attention will be paid to youngsters Choi Hyojoo and Shin Yubin, recently selected for Korea Republic’s team at the Tokyo Olympics.
Manika Batra (India) is looking to catapult her career into the WTT era, having been chosen as the 2018 Breakthrough Star following her gold medal exploits at that year’s Commonwealth Games. Meanwhile, Melanie Diaz (Puerto Rico) will be keen to join her sister Adriana in the main draw.
Standing in their way are some respected veterans of the game, not least Yu Mengyu (Singapore), who is the women’s singles top seed in the qualifying draw.