Why does table tennis seem to be very predictable at the HIGHEST level?

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Been watching WTTC17 and now some of Japan open, and often the results are nothing too suprising, the higher ranked player (even if it means only slightly higher) will usually win.

What i mean is that before a match you often will know who will win, usually the side with the Chinese player will win, that said, upsets do happen sometimes, but not often.

For example, looking at the WTTC in the mens singles the chinese player always won (except Zhang Jike losing to lee sangsu), and then Ma long beats Xu Xin then beats fanzhen Dong for the crown.

The same goes for the women's singles, the chinese beat everyone, then when it's CHN vs CHN the higher ranked player wins.

Adding further to this trend, i noticed that in the finals for both the mens and womens singles go to 7 games, being world #1 vs #2, but the other matches it would all be pretty one sided stomp, such as 4-0 or 4-1.

In the end we see world #1 for both mens and womens take the crown.

So far in the japan open 2017 we see similar results, Ma long is probably going to play fanzhendong again.

When i watch other sports and esports, the higher ranked player/team has the higher chance to win, but there is much more unpredictability in the results, upsets happen much more often, yet in table tennis if world #1 doesn't win then #2 will win.

Why is this?

EDIT: fan zhendong just won vs mizutani, so yes he will rematch ma long again in the japan open finals.
 
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Well, if you exclude all the chinese players, games are unpredictable. Watch ETTC
If there is a tournament only includes chinese players, it's unpredictable as well. Watch CSL or Chinese National Games
In big tournaments, CNT sends their best of best players who have a win rate beyond 90% when facing non-chinses players.
 
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disagree. I think it's because you watch in about 60fps. in real life your eyes can track up to 250fps, so recordings seem slow and easy to see what's going on. it looks like it's going about 1/4th as fast as it is.
 
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disagree. I think it's because you watch in about 60fps. in real life your eyes can track up to 250fps, so recordings seem slow and easy to see what's going on. it looks like it's going about 1/4th as fast as it is.

huht? i was talking about the overall tournament results not about the specifics going on during each point
 
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China always wins :OOO Shit I just went through all the events I have watched and you are actually right, how did I not see that???!!! :p

China has been the dominant force in TT for quite some time. There are a lot of factors. They have the largest pool of players in the world by far, the best trainers (all of the top 4 chinese have individual coaches apart from the national coach), probably the most professional environment, their tacky rubbers are said to be superior at the highest level and they also generally train more and with more discipline.
 
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@Shuki

Although you should probably read the OP first before posting :rolleyes:, I do need to say that lower FPS is just less information in the same time. I think a decent level of table tennis would be nearly unplayable at 60FPS due to the lack of information. It's easier to track at 60FPS from a camera because of the viewpoint.
 
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Well, compared to football:
in football there is less chance to get into shooting position and there is a chance that a shoot won't score a point.
Skilled players and good tactics lead to a higher chance to score points, but as the teams only has a few try, the luck has a higher impact.
In table tennis actually you have to score at least 33 point to win a match. Because of the high number of points played, the luck factor reduces.
It's something like rolling dices. Let's say you have to roll 5 or more to score a point. I will roll online 9 dices , I should get 5 or more on 3 dice: 5,2,2,3,3,1,4,6,3 -->I scored 2
once again: 2,2,1,3,5,4,5,2,3 -->2
again: 6,3,5,2,4,6,5,5,1 -->5
Then I roll 60, I should get 20:


dice6.png
dice5.png
dice6.png
dice5.png
dice2.png
dice5.png
dice1.png
dice2.png
dice4.png
dice4.png
dice3.png
dice4.png
dice6.png
dice3.png
dice6.png
dice2.png
dice2.png
dice4.png
dice4.png
dice4.png
dice1.png
dice4.png
dice3.png
dice1.png
dice4.png
dice4.png
dice4.png
dice1.png
dice5.png
dice2.png
dice6.png
dice4.png
dice3.png
dice6.png
dice1.png
dice2.png
dice3.png
dice3.png
dice3.png
dice5.png

EDIT: some are missing, I can only include 40 image in one post


--> 17

again:



-->20

again:



-->21

As you can see, on higher number of tries, probabilities are working better.
Of course, nor TT and football isn't that simple. We can see someone lose 4-0, and yet it's tough match. But bad luck can have a higher impact on a football match than on a TT, as a net ball is just one point, even three in a set can be ignored, but an own goal easily can be deadly.
Sorry, but I must speak about the recent Hungary-Andorra football match, where Hungary lost 1-0! It was the second ever win of the Andorra team. Their players aren't full time football players. Literally amateurs. In the match Andorra had 44 successful pass, while Hungary had 339. Team Andorra worth 600 000 euro. Team Hungary worth 24 000 000 euro. Andorra has 2 stadium at all, in Hungary 7 stadium has been built since 2010. There is more football player in Hungary than inhabitant in Andorra! And Andorra scored a goal, Hungary couldn't. I've never heard about something like that in TT. There are upsets, but not to such extent. Jeong Sangeun beating ML, or Ádám Pattantyús beating Chuang Chih Yuan. These were similar ones, but Jeong Sangeun is an upcoming young player and Pattantyús is a very good defender, which is a little different case. Do youknow similar upsets?
 
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The Golden State Warriors just defeated the Cleveland Cavaliers for the NBA championship. Which everyone knew was going to happen before the season started.
 
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I for one didn't think Liu Shiwen would lose to her younger teammate in the WTTC semifinal. I didn't thik Harimoto would defeat Mitzutani.
 
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It is not surprising if the better player (ranked higher) has a higher win-loose ratio than the weaker/lower ranked players.
Equally to that being a fact, it is also a fact that there are surprises or upsets.
Now if you didn't spot any surprises or upset in WTTC 2017 or Japan Open 2017, then i'm not sure what tournament you are watching

Today, the Chinese overall are stronger than the rest of the world.
Yesterday there was Sweden, tomorrow there could be Japan

That is sports for you, the only predictable part is the stronger players generally win.
Don't need to be a fortune teller to tell that:p
 
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I don't know in this tournament, but in the WTTC and in the whole World Tour circuit in 2016, the winning ratio of the highest ranked player was always 75%ish (full article here), so only 1 every 4 matches is an upset. It seems that the percentage is much higher with Chinese players and if the tournament is played close to China or in China itself, the amount of Chinese is higher so...

prediction_2016.jpg

Compared to football or basketball, the winning ratio of the highest ranked player/team is around 60-80% too, so it seems it's the same in most of the sports.
 
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I didn't read the full article, but many of these lower-ranked-player-wins upsets are not real upsets.
Obvious, when a CNT player with low ITTF ranking causes many 'ranking upsets', but we all know that they are top 20 level at least. Also, Harimoto did many 'upset', but in real only his win over Mizutani was an upset. Then there are closely ranked players, where the level difference is small.
 
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