First of all this topic is coming back again and again, I'm not sure it's worth opening new thread every time. See here:
https://www.tabletennisdaily.com/forum/showthread.php?19179-Top-Women-vs-Top-Men
Secondly I'm wondering where people get any evidence for this claim
"Table tennis is much much closer between genders than other sports." It's common agreement that there are basically no relevant data from top100/200/500 women competing with men so how you can say this? By watching Ito smashing Ding Ning in the TV? However impressive to watch the esthetics and "oh she is so fast" observations are pretty irrelevant. You need to face the opponent and beat him in best of 7, only that can show the real state. And for statistics you need to have many such matches before doing any general claim.
There are quite a lot of data outside professional world (and outside World Ranking level). In most countries women are allowed to enter team events in lower leagues. E.g. in my country any girl can compete in male team except she plays women first division (semi-professional level). The difference is typically 3-4 levels in other words girls who are good (>50%) in their second league are also reasonably successful (~50%) in men 5th division (that is one level below the first "nation-wide" division). In terms of ranking this means girls around NR#50 are around men NR#1000, around NR#20 they would be around men NR#400. There is no evidence that professional girls would be training more than professional men so why should this gap be significantly lower on World Raking level? Or why should all girls suck so much until they are let's say WR top10 and then suddenly they start to be effective against men style? I guess top girls in top shape (like Ito last week
can cause surprising upsets if competing in men tournament but these would be statistically very rare.