Yes, they are in their mid-30s now, but their decline started long ago. You can't say with a straight face that Ovtcharov has ever been the true world no.1🤣
Dima since his last injury has just never returned to his level.
When Dima was WR no 1, he was indeed the most feared player outside of China for the Chinese.
Dima's body has just been breaking down since then, and every time, the gear drops one level down.
Dima had a unique style with his serving stance and BH serve.
he didn't care for you to have full view of his serve and that was very interesting.
Germany still has a pretty strong domestic league, club base, memberships and fans.
I can't say the same for some of the other European players.
TT fan base is just so small.
It also doesn't help having China winning everything all the time.
For example - because Lin and Cheng won a mixed double olympic medal - guess what has happened?
corporate funding increased with their main sponsor - Taiwan Co-Bank. and it isn't just money for the top players, but overall money - that even elementary school players (never before) started to get funded. This is why Chinese Taipei has so many more youth on world tours today than, ever before. Including U11 and U13 (never before)
If that medal didn't happen, I doubt there would be some cash injection.
In badminon, Tai (also sponsored by Taiwan Co-Op bank) is doing very well, and many kids are now wanting to play badminton, so table tennis and badminton is the hottest sports at the moment.
But in TT, China is taking everything away and when they say they are killing the sport, it does have repercussions on energy being diverted else where. This includes from within China too.
Hence CTTA is on a mission to try and help non Chinese players and to make TT more interesting, but to me, it is a bit too late. Especially with WTT more focusing on Asia and rich Chinese or Asian businesses.
There are few lonely warriors out there that can challenge the Chinese, but collectively, there is way too many Chinese to beat and the last person to do 3 in a row was Miu Hirano.... and it doesn't happen often enough.
CTTA should really make a champions of champions league, with the 2 best super leagues teams from China, and some invitational teams from the top leagues. like an allstar team.
and have a "league" tournament and make it big. They should go away with "nation vs nation" and make it club vs club, or league vs league.