Who do you think will win the World Tour Grand Finals 2018?

  • Xu Xin

    Votes: 9 8.8%
  • Fan Zhendong

    Votes: 40 39.2%
  • Ma Long

    Votes: 27 26.5%
  • Liang Jingkun

    Votes: 6 5.9%
  • Tomokazu Harimoto

    Votes: 10 9.8%
  • Jang Woojin

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Lin Gaoyuan

    Votes: 6 5.9%
  • Hugo Calderano

    Votes: 2 2.0%
  • Jun Mizutani

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Other (Post Below)

    Votes: 2 2.0%

  • Total voters
    102
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%cough% Miu Hirano %cough%. But I guess the hype is too big right now to assess what's happened rationally. If I were to bet my house on this, Fan Zhendong is the heavy favorite to collect the prizes in the next 5 years.

Miu Hirano had a one-off win. Her style was cracked by the CNT. Harimoto had been improving over the last a year and a half, beating more and more top players. So far not a single player could return his serve well, let alone cracking his style.

The key is the return of Liu Guoliang. Whether China can beat Haritomoto depends heavily on Liu Guoliang's leadership.
 
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I can only hope LGY will not end up to be called Hao Shuai number 2 and got discarded. China does not need a CNT killer who lose to outsider in big tournaments. It is a long way before he can gain back LGL's trust. It is obviously too much pressure on him and he is not ready. May be even XX can't handle HT today but too bad it is LGY who took the blame. Congratulation HT for a near clean sweep. His eyes must be set on XX from now on who he has yet to beat and add to his collection. :cool:
 
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Insane stuff from Harimoto, I mean he beat all opponents 4-0 or 4-1 this tournament. I'm very happy for him. In general it's a good story for table tennis and China will try to fight back next year, it's a warning for them. On the other side Harimoto will try to improve his game even more next year. He still has to prove he can play on this level consistently.
 
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Miu Hirano had a one-off win. Her style was cracked by the CNT. Harimoto had been improving over the last a year and a half, beating more and more top players. So far not a single player could return his serve well, let alone cracking his style.
the more they play him, the better they'll know his serves. He is imporving, but what you do is extrapolating that growth linearly, which is not how the growth works. It's always logarithmic: fast at first, slow later, stops at some point. Diminishing returns and all. I'm a statistician so naturally I love stats. What do they tell us about the phenomenal year Harimoto had? You be the judge, other top players for comparison. The reason for my choice of Fan Zhendong becomes obvious as well.




Fan Zhendong is an absolute monster. Harimoto has been very hit or miss. Just check the game scores in the matches he lost.
 
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just saw the highlights of FZD vs Hugo on ITTF Youtube channel. great camera work and 1080p @ 60fps is beautiful. cmon ITTF, this needs to be the standard for atleast major tournaments.
they sell rights to TV channels and possibly laola1's paid subscription gets you that quality as well. I don't know many sports (save for esports) who just stream their stuff at 1080p@60fps for free.
 
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Tomokazu Harimoto is like this new Alfa Zero Google's chess AI neural network engine ... in the matches against traditional engines this "chess entity" dismantles the opposite side in a way that it's pieces are still there, but somehow can not engage into the real action ...

I dare to say both Lin Gaoyuang and Hugo have better swings on the both sides, but where not able to fully deploy them. Tomo certainly takes it off the bounce like no one else today, already has mentality and game iq on par with Waldner, Kong Linghui or Werner Schlager ... really amazing. What a KID : )
 
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Tomokazu Harimoto is like this new Alfa Zero Google's chess AI neural network engine ... in the matches against traditional engines this "chess entity" dismantles the opposite side in a way that it's pieces are still there, but somehow can not engage into the real action ...
don't you worry, the Chinese will just clone him and name the clone something like, I don't know, Leela Chess Zero perhaps? ;-)
 
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don't you worry, the Chinese will just clone him and name the clone something like, I don't know, Leela Chess Zero perhaps? ;-)

Perhaps, perhaps ... Not getting into your discussion guys : ) which is quite interesting to read, I must say.
Well CNT managed to do relatively well in the "cloning business" against the girls, but failed so far against the Kid ...
 
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Results from Day 3 and 4 (Sat 15 and Sun 16 13 December 2018):

Men's Singles

Quarter-finals:

[6] Lin Gaoyuan 4:2 Xu Xin [1] (11:3, 9:11, 13:11, 11:13, 11:2, 11:9)
[8] Jun Mizutani 4:2 Liang Jingkun [3] (7:11, 11:9, 8:11, 11:3, 11:6, 11:9)

[4] Tomokazu Harimoto 4:1 Jang Woojin [5] (12:10, 11:8, 11:7, 9:11, 11:9)
[7] Hugo Calderano 4:2 Fan Zhendong [2] (7:11, 11:9, 8:11, 11:3, 11:6, 11:9)

Semi-finals:

[6] Lin Gaoyuan 4:0 Jun Mizutani [8] (11:5, 11:9, 11:6, 12:10)
[4] Tomokazu Harimoto 4:0 Hugo Calderano [7] (11:7, 11:8, 11:8, 11:5)

Final:

[4] Tomokazu Harimoto 4:1 Lin Gaoyuan [6] (11:4, 13:15, 11:9, 11:9, 11:9)

Final Standings:
Gold: Tomokazu Harimoto (Japan) [4]
Silver: Lin Gaoyuan (China) [6]
Bronze: Jun Mizutani (Japan) [8]
Bronze: Hugo Calderano (Brazil) [7]


Women's Singles

Quarter-finals:

[6] Chen Meng 4:1 Wang Manyu [1] (16:14, 11:7, 10:12, 11:8, 16:14)
[7] Zhu Yuling 4:0 Liu Shiwen [3] (11:1, 11:6, 11:9, 11:6)

[5] Ding Ning 4:0 Cheng I-Ching [9] (11:6, 11:7, 11:9, 11:1)
[12] He Zhuojia 4:3 Kasumi Ishikawa [2] (11:4, 11:9, 11:13, 14:12, 9:11, 7:11, 11:9)

Semi-finals:

[6] Chen Meng 4:2 Zhu Yuling [7] (9:11, 11:6, 11:5, 5:11, 13:11, 11:3)
[12] He Zhuojia 4:2 Ding Ning [5] (12:14, 9:11, 19:17, 11:4, 11:6, 11:5)

Final:

[6] Chen Meng 4:1 He Zhuojia [12] (9:11, 11:5, 11:8, 12:10, 11:7)

Final Standings:
Gold: Chen Meng (China) [6]
Silver: He Zhuojia (China) [12]
Bronze: Zhu Yuling (China) [7]
Bronze: Ding Ning (China) [5]


Men's Doubles

Final:

[5] Jang Woojin/Lim Jonghoon 3:2 Ho Kwan Kit/Wong Chun Ting [3] (10:12, 13:11, 11:8, 10:12, 11:8)

Final Standings:
Gold: Jang Woojin/Lim Jonghoon (South Korea) [5]
Silver: Ho Kwan Kit/Wong Chun Ting (Hong Kong) [3]
Bronze: Jeoung Youngsik/Lee Sangsu (South Korea) [1]
Bronze: Masataka Morizono/Yuya Oshima (Japan) [2]


Women's Doubles

Final:

[1] Hina Hayata/Mima Ito 3:0 Chen Xingtong/Sun Yingsha [2] (11:9, 13:11, 12:10)

Final Standings:
Gold: Hina Hayata/Mima Ito (Japan) [1]
Silver: Chen Xingtong/Sun Yingsha (China) [2]
Bronze: Jeon Jihee/Yang Haeun (South Korea) [3]
Bronze: Chen Ke/Wang Manyu (China) [4]


Mixed Double

Final:

[7] Wong Chun Ting/Doo Hoi Kem 3:0 Jang Woojin/Cha Hyo Sim [2] (11:6, 11:8, 11:4)

Final Standings:
Gold: Wong Chun Ting/Doo Hoi Kem (Hong Kong) [7]
Silver: Jang Woojin/Cha Hyo Sim (South Korea/North Korea) [2]
Bronze: Masataka Morizono/Mima Ito (Japan) [6]
Bronze: Lim Jonghoon/Yang Haeun (South Korea) [4]


Source: https://www.ittf.com/tournament/2825/seamaster-2018-ittf-world-tour-grand-finals/#information
 
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was to be expected, what were CNT thinking fielding two Miu Hiranos? She's not that good a doubles player anyway.

what was most striking to me is that the 2 Chinese girls didn't seem to talk a lot together, and happy to play together. The Japanese girls enjoyed themselves much more, smiled and kept encouraging each other. There seems to be something wrong in the CNT mentality.
 
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what was most striking to me is that the 2 Chinese girls didn't seem to talk a lot together, and happy to play together. The Japanese girls enjoyed themselves much more, smiled and kept encouraging each other. There seems to be something wrong in the CNT mentality.
true but that's the sad reality of belonging to the top nation. The expectations and pressure are immense. You win? Who cares, it's been that way for decades. Also explains the "another day in the office" expression you see on some CNT members' faces after a win, which some people complain about. You lose? Prepare to get mauled by your own media and netizens. It's no fun.
 
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