Sabine Winter switches to antispin

[Ninja26Go]

Sorry that was a bit far LOL! I just personally absolutely hate it, its just not TT anymore. But sorry to whoever I offended, I am sure there something you like about it.

 

[zeio]

i do love Hashimoto but she doesn't have the killer FH of Sabine else she'd be well inside WR10. Her FH or BH are dangerous but mostly because of surprise unlike Sabine who has always had a huge FH, maybe the most powerful among all women. (not the most consistent though)

its normal for Calderano to cool down this year after 2025. He will be strong again in 2027 and 2028.

HY doesn't have a killer FH either and how does she manage it? Hashimoto's problem as I kept touching on has nothing to do with her skills but simply her teammates being too good at playing combination styles, just like how JSH was to RSM and OSE. It's just like Winter who has serious trouble getting past JNT players, with her FH getting shut down severely.

 

[Ninja26Go]

ANTI FLANTI <0.3 SHOULD BE ROOTED OUT OF THE SPORT.

The early history of table tennis unveils a fact that the "barefoot" wooden racket without rubber coating has remained a legit choice till 1970s.
Аntispin materials is very much like a pure wooden racket due to a very poor dynamical friction, and those infamous Flanti Antis is the most destructive material on markerl to ruin the game badly.
Nope, we dont seek for a total ban of antispin materials, we do argue for an effective restrictive moderation of rubber friction. We did, we do and will strongly insist on the elimination of the low-friction rubbers, such as scandalous materials similar to a pure wooden blade CoF< 0.3. Flanti Antispin gonna to eventually make the game a mockery of the sport, --some unruly game of a chance., full of chaotical rallies and unforced mishits.

Please, note the true reason that ITTF did ultimately disfavoured the uncovered pure wooden rackets -- ITTF stopped the use of uncovered blades back in mid 1970s for natural fear of getting the sport of table tennis into an unruly chaotical spectacle.

View attachment 40526

the one time I have to agree with Igor. I HATE anti.

 

[Takkyu_wa_inochi]

Anyway Sabine Winter much closer to WR10 than Adriana Diaz

 

[NextLevel]

Man, it's been a rough week for the Tiebans.

View attachment 40543

You did it again. You will see him rush to post here once she loses or struggles. I wanted to see how long it would take him to acknowledge this one....

 

[NextLevel]

i am too pessimistic as usual. WR10 within reach then an Olympic medal

I am still pessimistic and very pleasantly surprised. But Germany is a serious country and they are working on measures and countermeasures.

 

[NextLevel]

As I stated at the very beginning, the thing Winter needed most was luck to avoid JNT players, which she did, and a year later she has only gotten past 1 of them (1W8L in 2025, 0W1L in 2026), whom is strictly speaking not even on the JNT.

Getting past an injured CXT and WYD, both of whom are known to be poor against combination players, is nothing to write home about. It doesn't change the fact that some relatively unknown players can give Winter hell and that's often what happens at the Olympics.

And getting past Zhu Yuling?

 

[NextLevel]

As for WD, keep in mind Winter/WY lost to Sawettabut/Paranang at China Smash 2025, the same THA players that took out IND and PRK to finish with WT bronze at Asian Games 2022 and handed FRA a tearful 1st-round exit at Paris 2024 (which I foreshadowed not once but twice). For IND, the role model that inspired Winter, they got taken out by SGP w/ 3 young players at ATTTC 2025 (here, here).

Given the above, folks can't just look at the wins and ignore the losses. That's why CNT is so hard to beat as a team.

The German doubles teams are health permitting, some combination of Winter Kauffmann Ying and Mittelham. Citing pairs that wont make the Oylmpic team is fun but completely besides the point. And there is XT of course...

 

[karupinkun]

As I stated at the very beginning, the thing Winter needed most was luck to avoid JNT players, which she did, and a year later she has only gotten past 1 of them (1W8L in 2025, 0W1L in 2026), whom is strictly speaking not even on the JNT.

Getting past an injured CXT and WYD, both of whom are known to be poor against combination players, is nothing to write home about. It doesn't change the fact that some relatively unknown players can give Winter hell and that's often what happens at the Olympics.

just asking, but where are these relatively unknown players that Winter lost to in the last like 9 months? Of course you are right that she has a bad winrate against the japanese players, but other then that I feel she is quite consitant and dont lose against lower ranked players often

 

[NextLevel]

just asking, but where are these relatively unknown players that Winter lost to in the last like 9 months? Of course you are right that she has a bad winrate against the japanese players, but other then that I feel she is quite consitant and dont lose against lower ranked players often

He is pointing to struggles against players like Doo Hoi Kem (unknown, yeah) and Sally Moyland (who based on her prelims performance is clearly levalling up) and other things that happened earlier in her period using anti like losing games to Yu Fu. He hasn't pointed out that unusual for a combination player, her results against her teammates and opposition has largely gotten better with thr switch and not worse, though to be fair, we still need to see her play Kauffmann more.

Even the losses to JNT players other than Nagasaki and Harimoto (who were both higher ranked than Winter at the time she lost to them) largely took place when Winter was still eligible to play in feeders. It's largely doing everything to point out the downside (so that when something goes wrong, he can say he saw it coming) without any desire to acknowledge the massive overperformance that Winter had sustained and how far she is ahead of her teammates and other European players. Everyone loses. Every style has risks (look at Lin Shidong and Harimoto if you doubt this). But you will never hear zeio simply admit that Sabine has done more than enough to play for Germany in 2028 if her health remains stable. There is no serious argument to take anyone but Kaufmann over her at this point.

 

[pongfugrasshopper]

Top 50 is a very achievable goal since she is already 57. But top 20 is unrealistic. There's a number of names outside the top 20 that will have a far better chance: Nagasaki, Chen Yi, JCH, Hana Goda, He Zhuojia, Honoka Hashimoto, Yokoi, Qin Yuxuan to name a few. But I'm rooting for her to go as far as she can!

didn't age well

I think at the time it was a reasonable assertion. But I'm happy to be wrong in this case. Being able to pivot if the facts reveal it's needed is a strength rather than a weakness.

 

[zeio]

just asking, but where are these relatively unknown players that Winter lost to in the last like 9 months? Of course you are right that she has a bad winrate against the japanese players, but other then that I feel she is quite consitant and dont lose against lower ranked players often

Please look up the meaning of "give (one) hell". Let me do it for you.

https://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/give+hell

3. To produce or present problems or challenges for one.

 

[Ninja26Go]

Anyway Sabine Winter much closer to WR10 than Adriana Diaz

Ok facts are facts this is true!

 

[Takkyu_wa_inochi]

Anyway Sabine Winter much closer to WR10 than Adriana Diaz

The last step is always the most difficult one

 

[NextLevel]

Not really, Mima has a lot of points to defend from WTtC and World Cup so unless someone else gets a lot of points or Mima defends those points well, Sabine will.be #10 sometime before June as all her significant points are more recent and she can gain from World Cup and will lose nothing for WTTC

Use ittf.com/ranking. It is more insightful even if it doesn't have pictures.

 

[Takkyu_wa_inochi]

Not really, Mima has a lot of points to defend from WTtC and World Cup so unless someone else gets a lot of points or Mima defends those points well, Sabine will.be #10 sometime before June as all her significant points are more recent and she can gain from World Cup and will lose nothing for WTTC

Use ittf.com/ranking. It is more insightful even if it doesn't have pictures.

Yeh I was kind of thinking the same but sandbagging

 

[NextLevel]

Vs Wei Shihao in a handicap match.

 

[Airoc]

There is no serious argument to take anyone but Kaufmann over her at this point.

That said, serious arguments haven´t been the strongest quality of the German association over the years, placing Sabine constantly in the position of the player who just did not make the team, good enough for warming up some under-performers and cheerleading from the bench.

And then when she got a chance in a big tournament, she usually messed it up quite badly, backing up the arguments against her.

Those day should really be over now

 

[NextLevel]

That said, serious arguments haven´t been the strongest quality of the German association over the years, placing Sabine constantly in the position of the player who just did not make the team, good enough for warming up some under-performers and cheerleading from the bench.

And then when she got a chance in a big tournament, she usually messed it up quite badly, backing up the arguments against her.

Those day should really be over now

Her backhand rally play was really an exploitable weakness and it was easy to take her out of the game just rallying with it because inverted gives fuel to the opponent and she couldn't cover the whole table with the forehand at that speed. It is interesting how her performance with anti brings back into focus the question of technical stability. Is she just a much better player or did she stop underperforming? People will always prefer choking narratives, but I think they are overused.

 

[zeio]

Speak of the devil.

https://www.tabletennisdaily.com/fo...ed-by-aito-10-15-march-2026.39027/post-567702
WTT CS Chongqing 2026
WS R32
Liu Yangzi 3-0 Winter (5, 9, 9)
G1 53, 55, 115
G2 01, 41, 42, 44, 54, 56, 66, 67, 87, 88, 98, 99, 119
G3 52 endline edge for LYZ and TO for Winter, 62, 63, 73, 74, 84, 87 TO for LYZ, 97, 99, 119

just asking, but where are these relatively unknown players that Winter lost to in the last like 9 months? Of course you are right that she has a bad winrate against the japanese players, but other then that I feel she is quite consitant and dont lose against lower ranked players often

Please look up the meaning of "give (one) hell". Let me do it for you.

https://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/give+hell

3. To produce or present problems or challenges for one.

https://www.tabletennisdaily.com/fo...ash-2026-singapore-2-19-3-1.38748/post-566549

That G4 actually highlights the biggest weakness of combination styles that is best described by the Chinese wisdom- 力敵不如智取/outsmarting rather than outfighting. Look no further than HKG vs GER at Tokyo 2020. There is a very specific range of shot quality that, when pinpointed, make combination styles helpless.

Ishikawa wasn't all that good against choppers before the ABS ball but somehow she had never lost to HY.