How much potential does Ma Lin have in London Olympics?

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Hello all !
I am new to this forum and it's my first post. Yay! Nice to meet you all! I am here because I saw the video where Dan was playing against Ma Lin. It is awesome mate! I am a big fan of Ma Lin... really love his playing style that one-shot-kill leaving no chance for his opponents to attack. But his performance obviously is going down after 2008 Olympics. I was wondering if the Chinese National Team has determined the players to play in 2012 Olympics. Is Ma Lin in? Also, I am a big supporter of Wang Hao as well. How is the possibility for him winning the gold medal?

Actually, what I am seeing is that both Ma Lin and Wang Hao are not doing well recently. Wang Hao failed to proceed to Semi-Final in Austrian Open. So did Ma Lin in Harmony China Open about a month ago. It seems to me that Chinese penhold players are not as dominating as decades before. As a penhold lover, am I too pessimistic as to the future of penhold style?

By the way, I am moving to England as an exchange student next year. Hope I can attend the London Olympics!!! :)

Charles
 

Bai

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I think Ma long should be alternated Ma lin to attend Olympic 2012. You can view Ma long"s great perfermances at Austrian Open 2011 Final and China Open 2011(SU ZHOU).
 

Dan

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Hello all !
I am new to this forum and it's my first post. Yay! Nice to meet you all! I am here because I saw the video where Dan was playing against Ma Lin. It is awesome mate! I am a big fan of Ma Lin... really love his playing style that one-shot-kill leaving no chance for his opponents to attack. But his performance obviously is going down after 2008 Olympics. I was wondering if the Chinese National Team has determined the players to play in 2012 Olympics. Is Ma Lin in? Also, I am a big supporter of Wang Hao as well. How is the possibility for him winning the gold medal?

Actually, what I am seeing is that both Ma Lin and Wang Hao are not doing well recently. Wang Hao failed to proceed to Semi-Final in Austrian Open. So did Ma Lin in Harmony China Open about a month ago. It seems to me that Chinese penhold players are not as dominating as decades before. As a penhold lover, am I too pessimistic as to the future of penhold style?

By the way, I am moving to England as an exchange student next year. Hope I can attend the London Olympics!!! :)

Charles

Hey Charles! Welcome to the forum. I hope you have a great time here.

Hehe i wish i could knock with Ma Lin again but best not get to greedy :). Yeah Wang Hao and Zhang Jike are on Chinas list for London 2012.

About penholders... I think Xu Xin will be the next big force of penholders after Ma Lin and Wang Hao. The problem is that shakehand players backhand is so good now that its hard for penholders to stay in the game.

Awesome! Where will you be living in England? I have tickets for London 2012 i cant wait!

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy S2 using tapatalk
 

Bai

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Bai

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Hey Charles! Welcome to the forum. I hope you have a great time here.

Hehe i wish i could knock with Ma Lin again but best not get to greedy :). Yeah Wang Hao and Zhang Jike are on Chinas list for London 2012.

About penholders... I think Xu Xin will be the next big force of penholders after Ma Lin and Wang Hao. The problem is that shakehand players backhand is so good now that its hard for penholders to stay in the game.

Awesome! Where will you be living in England? I have tickets for London 2012 i cant wait!

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy S2 using tapatalk

I think XU xin have a good oppotunity in 2016 Olympic,for in that moment MA LIN shoule be already retired. HE is the best penholders after MA lin in China and he is left handed.
It is very clear the third guy will be selected from MA LIN and Ma long. MA LIN has more precious expersence than MA long and he was the champion of Bei jing 2008. But Ma long have a great perfermances at Austrian Open 2011 Final and China Open 2011.
His forhand and backhand technic is wonderful .And his action was the fastest i have ever seen.
In my opinon two of three guys are penholders is impossible, so I support MA long. For LIU guo liang, this is a hard choose for he has tremendouse choices.
 
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I don't think pengrip is becoming a redundant style as such but i guess when world class players at the top of the world rankings are pengrip players like Ma Lin and Wang Hao even Ryu Seung Min previously, I guess people really start to pinpoint the weaknesses in the pengrip game so they can gain a competitive advantage in a match over those top players in finals and stuff.

I think Xu Xin is the next big thing for China, he is highly creative in his shot selection and takes big risks. If he can learn to control his mental game a bit more he can be a great player. I was told by the NZ uni games coach that the games recorded the sequence of points won in each set of each match and it appeared that Xu Xin went on runs of winning many points at once but could also lose many points at once. If he can control this a bit more he can make it to the top I think.

As for Ma Lin I'm not sure what he has left in the bag. He's a class player but I feel he is becoming outdated by the younger players. Would love to see Zhang Jike steal the gold in London myself.
 
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I agree PingPongPom Penholders aren't out dated and their weaknesses are just as equal to shakehanders (with out a good middle for the rpb players) I think that Ma Lin wouldn't really want to worry about the London Olympics because all he's really worried about is the 2013 Worlds because that'd give him is grand slam. I think he has it in him to do well after winning the VW China Open. He's just not that focused right now because it's 1.5 years before he can try for his grand slam. As for the Gold next year I hope Wang Hao gets it. He's been unlucky as of yet and with the new seating rules he has a great chance to win it this time as he'll less likely have to play ZJK because of the less participants rule.
 
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Yeah, Penholders will never ever get redundant, in my opinion. Yeah with Ma long and Zhang Jike doing so well, they seem to out shine for the most part the penholders on the team, but you also have to consider the fact that Ma Lin and even almost Wang Hao are either out of their prime, or starting to leave it. Penholders will always have a place in the game because they have an undeniable advantage when it comes to serving and the short game. Every point starts with that, and most all points are decided by who gets to initiate the offense first, in which case, if you can master the short game, like penholders, you have a great advantage. Its for this exact reason that despite being probably the best counter looper in the world, Ma Long still can't beat Wang Hao usually on the biggest of stages. I think its quite poignant that despite most of the new generation of Chinese players using shakehand, there still always is a unproportional percentage saved for penholders. Plus, there is the consideration that the Chinese national team must take into account that for most other foreign players, they aren't as used to playing against penholders, and therefore have more difficulty against them than they would against a Chinese shakehand player. If you look at the past decade or so, other than Wang Liqin winning the world championships those three times, penholders have really dominated in most of the big competitions. This despite the fact that out of the entire world population of table tennis players, they make such a small percentage, even in China nowadays. That just really shows that despite being really hard in the beginning to learn, once you actually truly master penhold, it does have some distinct advantages that make it really special. I think as more and more people adopt the Wang Hao style of play, there will always be a penholder in the top 3 of the Chinese team.

That having been said, I don't think Ma Lin has a good chance of playing in the 2012 olympics singles. Despite being the reigning champion, he is getting old, and simply has more weaknesses in some aspects of his game that Ma Long doesn't have. The older generation has had their time, I think it would be really de-motivating if the Chinese team didn't let the newer generation have a crack at the olympics. Ma Long in particular has earned the right to go.
 
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Hey Charles! Welcome to the forum. I hope you have a great time here.

Hehe i wish i could knock with Ma Lin again but best not get to greedy :). Yeah Wang Hao and Zhang Jike are on Chinas list for London 2012.

About penholders... I think Xu Xin will be the next big force of penholders after Ma Lin and Wang Hao. The problem is that shakehand players backhand is so good now that its hard for penholders to stay in the game.

Awesome! Where will you be living in England? I have tickets for London 2012 i cant wait!

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy S2 using tapatalk

I am so jealous that you had a chance to play with Ma Lin lol. I will be staying in Exeter by the way. I am not sure if I can attend London Olympics since academic year in England always starts in October doesn't it. I hope I can come to London earlier before the school starts :)
 
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It is a fantastic insight Scylla!!!
That's right everyone... Ma Lin is getting old. I am now hoping Wang Hao can win the gold.
Some have been criticising that Xu Xin's footwork is too slow compared to Ma Long and Zhang Jike. Is that true? I didn't put my eyes on Xu Xin coz I thought he was still too young. But right.. I think it's about time to do it :)
 
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As far as I understand it, there are two issues.

1) China only gets 2 entries for singles.

2) I think that the Rankings that came out after the World Championships in May 2011 were used to determine who gets to go to the Olympics. The two highest ranked players from a given country go to the Olympics.

In the "June" rankings that came out on 5/15/11 -- just after the World Championships -- Wang Hao was ranked #1 and Zhang Jike was ranked #3 (Boll was #2) so the top two players from China were Wang Hao and Zhang Jike. I believe that is where Dan got the info that Wang Hao and Zhang Jike are going to play in the singles in the 2012 Olympics.

So unless the Coaches from the Chinese team pull some fancy swicheroo it should be Wang Hao and Zhang Jike going to play in the singles event at the Olympics in 2012.

I would like to see Wang Hao, Wang Liqin, Ma Lin, Ma Long and Zhang Jike get a chance to win the Gold at the Olympics. But, I we will see what will happen and who will win in about another 9 months.
 
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