I have a guess as to a possible reason for playing LGY for 2 singles that doesn't involve Team 2 tanking the team match. Haha.
Note that in ABC v XYZ, the lineups are as follows:
- 1st Match B/C vs Y/Z (Doubles)
- 2nd Match A vs X (1st Singles)
- 3rd Match C vs Z (2nd Singles)
- 4th Match A vs Y (3rd Singles)
- 5th Match B vs X (4th Singles)
1. Since Team 2 got the XYZ combination, the player who plays 2 singles will play the 2nd and the 5th match as compared to the ABC combination where the player who plays 2 singles will play the 2nd and 4th match. If Team 2 truly believes that LGY is their weakest link as compared to LJK and WCQ, then it makes sense to "hide" LGY by letting him play two singles in the X position since he will only have to play his 2nd singles match if the team match goes to the decider. This allows WCQ and LJK to play in the first 3 of 4 matches of the team tie. I think if Team 2 got the ABC Combination, there's a good chance LGY would have played doubles as the B position since he would only have to play the last match if the team tie goes to the decider.
2. Team 2 can pretty much predict Team 1's lineup. XX/ML usually play doubles and FZD plays 2 singles. ML almost always plays the 3rd match as the C/Z player because you generally want him playing singles ahead of XX. Therefore, if Team 2 can make an educated guess as to Team 1's likely lineup, they can adjust their lineup so that their players can best match up to Team 1's lineup. Let's assume Team 2 predicts Team 1's lineup as follows:
- 1st Match- ML/XX vs Y/Z
- 2nd Match- FZD vs X
- 3rd Match- ML vs Z
- 4th Match- FZD vs Y
- 5th Match- XX vs X
What would be the best lineup considering matchups and H2H records?
LGY has a poor record vs ML. In 4 ITTF matches, he lost them all to ML including 4-0 losses in their last 3 encounters. However, LGY has a 50% win rate against XX in ITTF matches and a 30% win rate against FZD in ITTF matches, including winning 2 of the last 3 matches against FZD. While he's still an underdog against all of them, stats show LGY has his chances against XX and FZD but is outmatched by ML,
so playing him as the X player makes sense.
WCQ, on the other hand, actually has losing records against both FZD (1W 4L) and XX (0W 2L) and a winning record against ML (2W 1L). While he's definitely more than capable of playing 2 singles given his recent form, past results do show that among the 3 players on Team 2, he's probably the most comfortable playing against ML.
This makes the Z position ideal for him. Had he been the X position and played 2 singles, he would have no chance to play ML and would end up playing FZD and XX, both of whom he has losing records against. Being the Z player also ensures that no matter what, he will play 2 matches in the team tie (1st and 3rd matches), so if Team 2 views him as their best player, they would at least be sure to get 2 matches out of him.
LJK, being a right-hander, is pretty much sure to play doubles in a team with 2 other lefties. The only choice to be made is if he plays the Y or Z position. If Y, he plays FZD and if Z, he plays ML. LJK has come close but hasn't beaten ML yet. On the other hand, while LJK has a losing record against FZD, he has beaten Fan in 3 of their last 4 encounters.
Therefore, the Y position fits LJK.
Obviously, the strategy didn't work and team 2 still lost, but maybe Team 1 is just that much better. In hindsight, it's easy to see that ML was nearly unstoppable yesterday, so maybe it might have been better to "sacrifice" LGY against ML in the 3rd match since neither LJK nor WCQ could probably have beaten ML yesterday given ML's amazing form. In hindsight, maybe Team 2 might have done better with WCQ playing 2 singles. However, all things considered, I think Team 2's lineup yesterday had merits and was definitely a valid strategy against the Team 1 favorites.
