How much should TT players earn per match

[Icemanspirit]

Just to put into the court as @Alborz likes to refer to football-players. In Germany 10% of the football-players can retire after their professional career. The other 90% have to work or pursue studies while they are playing in professional leagues. People like Christiano Ronaldo and Messi are exceptions. Coming back to the original topic. Table tennis just hasn't got the standing and PR-power that football has. Players like Boll, Zhang Jike and Ma Long earn a lot through additional advertising contracts. The payment per match is not as representative as you think. Consider that we are not the majority. The majority of the society decides what it is interested in and that is the area where the money goes to then.

 

[Tony's Table Tennis]

Just to put into the court as @Alborz likes to refer to football-players. In Germany 10% of the football-players can retire after their professional career. The other 90% have to work or pursue studies while they are playing in professional leagues. People like Christiano Ronaldo and Messi are exceptions. Coming back to the original topic. Table tennis just hasn't got the standing and PR-power that football has. Players like Boll, Zhang Jike and Ma Long earn a lot through additional advertising contracts. The payment per match is not as representative as you think. Consider that we are not the majority. The majority of the society decides what it is interested in and that is the area where the money goes to then.

Yep, that is why I am asking that we compare with non Tier 1 sports.
So is USD16000 a good amount compared to others?

For example in another forum, one member suggest that we can still compare with Tier 1 sports, but maybe the 2nd division, and in baseball a player gets something like USD2000 so that means most of our TT top players will be earning more than your 2nd tier baseball players.

Alborz should rather go and reserch and add some facts, than oppose to just post opnions.
I'm hoping this thread can be a useful thread with facts!

 

[dici]

Actually, there are many factors, not only about how good a player is, and how hard the player trained. More honestly, nobody care about how hard you train, they won't pay you based on that. The main concern about how much they willing to pay you, most of time, is that if they pay you X amount of money, can they earn back 10X amount of money by selling the product related to you.

It just like Messi, Rolnado, or even USA basketball, football's jersey. Those team earn alots just from selling the jersey and hat/cap. So, the main reason still is that, if CTTSL willing to pay 1mil to Timo Boll, then will they get back 2mil? I believe it is hard for table tennis.... But if we compare to badminton, Yonex may earn way more than butterfly by selling Lee Chong Wei's racket. You won't able to imagine that Yonex introduce the racket few month ago, then my friend's uncle bought four of them lol....about 200 usd each.

For tier 1 sport, I only know more on USA sports salary than football, since usually no body care about those smaller football club spending. The only one I know is Queen Park Ranger they did mention they only spend like 100-300k to invest on young potential player. After that they sell the player out for like 600k-1mil. But for USA sport, like basketball, baseball. The super star player may earn 18-24mil per year. However, majority of the players only earns around 400 to 1mil per year. If they got into second division, then become 30-40k per year. The 2nd division of basebell is about 60k per year.

For Tennis, yes they may earn from sponsor, but it depends. Some sponsor may not pay upfront, some of them may require you to play X amount of tournament before they pay you full. And the price for hiring a coach is not cheap. It may cost around mils a year not include those accommodation. And like Federer, if you know, he got 3 coaches instead of 1...

So back to TT league salary, honestly, I do not fore see the possibility of paying millions to a player in any league. It just simple, even in CTTSL, not all the match are open for ticket sale. They simply unable to get back what they spent from ticketing, and other related product sales. If you talk about jersey selling and those stuff? Sorry, Kobe Bryan, Kevin Duran and Lebron James come before anyone in China. People may willing to wear this as their casual shirt. Table tennis shirt? Probably only for those who play TT...

 

[Tony's Table Tennis]

Here is the prize money for the main world tour events this year:

http://www.ittf.com/_front_page/ittf1.asp?category=prize_money

Still no news from the European forum members about how much top league pay players?

 

[Tony's Table Tennis]

The Australian soccer/football players get paid USD6000 a match. They are one of the weakest team at this year's Fifa world cup but also one of the better paid teams too. This is according to an AFP news article I read today. It also stated they are due to pay cuts in the future.

Here is a lovely article by Bruce on Facebook:

[h=5]Bruce H. Liu shared Bay Area Table Tennis Federation's photo.[/h]13 hours ago

No Money in Ping Pong? Part III

Did not expect to write a series on the topic when I wrote the first one but here you go. The photo is Zhou Xin with his brand-new Audi A5. Zhou Xin is a former Chinese National secondary team member who currently coaches full-time at ICC.

Part I
http://goo.gl/0gFVr4

Part II
http://goo.gl/wPT9Wn

Happened to chat with Zhou Xin the other day. I asked about what the situation was when he was in the team. Here is a summary of what he told me, written on a piece of restaurant napkin.

Luxurious car list: (Just on top of Zhou Xin’s head. Some have been mentioned in I or II)

- Cai Zhenhua: Audi A8
- Zhang Jike: Had a Maserati before but traded it in for a Bentley and BMW X6.
- Zhang Chao: A Porsche
- Li Ping: Porsche
- Ma Lin: Porsche Cayenne
- Liu Guoliang: Audi Q7
- Kong Linghui: Audi S8
- Xu Xin: BMW M3
- Ma Long: BMW 650
- Guo Yue: BMW 750
- Li Xiaoxia: Land Rover
- Wang Liqin: Doesn’t own a car. Zhou said that Wang probably gets around just fine.

Note that imported cars in China are significantly more expensive than in the USA.

As for Super League salary (in US$), Zhou Xin estimated that about 25 of them receive over $116K. The lowest probably starts from $36K. This figure is the base salary for the 3-month season. There are also winning bonus starting at $850 per match. For critical matches the winning bonus can be doubled.

In addition to the salary, top played get commercial endorsement too. Some deals can get ludicrous. Players also have chances to be invited to play in commercial tournaments. For second or third tier (in China standard) players, the appearance fee can be a pretty good supplemental income.

However, making big bucks is not easy. Here is a typical week of Zhou Xin’s life before he left the team.

Monday - Friday (Except Thursday afternoon which is a break for everyone)

- 7:00 AM: Wake up for breakfast.
- 8:15 AM: Get on the bus, provided by the National Team, from the dorm to the training facility.
- 8:30 AM: One player leads a 20-minute warmup. Coach gives a speech.
- 9:30 AM: The training starts.
- 11:30 AM: 30-minute fitness training.
- 12:00 PM: Lunch and go back to the dorm for break.
- 3:15 PM: Get on the bus to go back to the training facility.
- 3:30 PM: Start the afternoon training.
- 6:20 PM: The official training is over. However, most players continue to train on their own, with coaches, or with their own partners.
- 7:10 PM: Get on the last bus going back to the dorm.

Saturday morning

- Match play (giant round robin or some other formats)
- 2:00 PM: Go to track and field court for physical training, most of time with a professional trainer. This is what Zhou Xin dislikes most. Puking is not unusual.
- 3:30/4:00 PM: Finished.

Sunday is supposed to be a break day. However, almost everyone stays to train “voluntarily” in the morning.

This is for the Chinese National Team 2. According to Zhou, Team 1 trains less on the table and spends more time on the physical training. It gets even tougher in the closed training before major tournaments.

So, you want to earn big bucks? Can you handle the training?


-End-

I've send him the training schedule for CNT B womens team, which is also similar to mens team, just that the one I have included academic studies in it too, and training goes into the evening.

In deed not easy to train full time and fight with players from 30 provinces to make the national b team, yet along national a team.
But again, this is China, we have heard some salaries of other sports, but we haven't heard of TT players in other countries.

For Zhou Xin above, he is earning money as a coach now, not as a player.

 

[tack_and_grip]

No Money in Ping Pong? Part III
...

Well, I don't have numbers to offer, but I think it’s hard to benchmark CTTSL salaries because nowhere else has as much state and corporate sponsorship as they do.

As much as I think Ovtcharov and Boll deserve their pay for their spectacle (to me), I kind of doubt this sort of amount is sustainable solely based on commercial grounds (i.e. viewership or merchandise)

For example, the Beijing women’s team head coach Zhang Lei attributed their failure to secure continuing sponsorship to the league’s “lukewarm performance”
http://sports.sina.com.cn/o/2014-05-09/03597155819.shtml

Whether or not the renumeration for Chinese national players and coaches is justified is totally another question since it involves the value of the sport to the state...

PS: On a related note, I think China dominates the sport precisely of the unmatched level of resources and expectation she commits into the sport. And so this complicates the question of whether it’s fair to clamp down on the Chinese (so that outcomes are less certain and the game becomes more interesting to watch.)

 

[Mr. RicharD]

In Chinese Super League this is what an average player can make considering Zhou Xin used to play in the Super League.

"As for Super League salary (in US$), Zhou Xin estimated that about 25 of them receive over $116K. The lowest probably starts from $36K. This figure is the base salary for the 3-month season. There are also winning bonus starting at $850 per match. For critical matches the winning bonus can be doubled."

And since Zhou Xin took Dima to 7 games a couple of years ago it's a shame that players of similar skill level aren't payed the same because of fame. However I agree that Table Tennis players deserve to be paid as much as any other sport out there considering the amount of skill, training, and discipline is equal if not greater than any other sport on the planet.

 

[Tony's Table Tennis]

Well, I don't have numbers to offer, but I think it’s hard to benchmark CTTSL salaries because nowhere else has as much state and corporate sponsorship as they do.

As much as I think Ovtcharov and Boll deserve their pay for their spectacle (to me), I kind of doubt this sort of amount is sustainable solely based on commercial grounds (i.e. viewership or merchandise)

For example, the Beijing women’s team head coach Zhang Lei attributed their failure to secure continuing sponsorship to the league’s “lukewarm performance”
http://sports.sina.com.cn/o/2014-05-09/03597155819.shtml

Whether or not the renumeration for Chinese national players and coaches is justified is totally another question since it involves the value of the sport to the state...

PS: On a related note, I think China dominates the sport precisely of the unmatched level of resources and expectation she commits into the sport. And so this complicates the question of whether it’s fair to clamp down on the Chinese (so that outcomes are less certain and the game becomes more interesting to watch.)

Your first post and a very good one too!!