phase 1 of qualifiers for WTTTC 2020 is happening now
[stupid for ITTF to make this tournament on an Olympic year]
Sora Matsushima won 3-2 against Jin Ueda !
My coach Hidetoshi Oya is in the tournament but already lost 3 games :-/
He is due to play against Sora next !
you can follow results here
https://www.tv-tokyo.co.jp/tabletennis/2019/wttc2020_selection/
there is even cameras on 2 tables. you may need a VPN (setting to Japan)
No need for VPN to watch the matches. Just go to the TV Tokyo Table Tennis Youtube Channel and watch
Results can be found on the JTTA website. Just click the PDFs. http://www.jtta.or.jp/tournament/tabid/122/rptid/579/Default.aspx
Format is similar to the 2019 trials where the winner of group A and winner of group B play each other for 1st place. Then, the runner-up of group A and runner-up of group B play each other for 3rd place, and so on. This determines their initial ranking and only the top few can participate in the final stage of the qualifications in December.
The 5 players for the JNT for the 2020 WTTC will be:
- The 3 Olympics participants (2 Highest WR + Discretionary Selection for the 3rd Team member to be announced Jan. 6, 2020)
- The Winner of the 2020 All-Japan National Championships
- The Winner of the WTTC 2020 Domestic Trials. (First Stage is the one happening now from Oct. 22-23. The final stage will be on Dec. 21, 2019 where the winner of the tournament makes the team)
If there are less than 5 players on the team because one person fills two or or more of the criteria above, then the empty slots will be filled by discretionary selection based on certain criteria such as 2019 performance and "potential to grow." (For example, if Ito wins the All-Japan Championships 2020 and has the highest WR in Jan. 2020, there'll only be 4 spots filled, so the extra spot will be filled by discretionary selection.)
What's interesting here is that the final stage of the Domestic Trials (Dec. 21, 2019) will happen before the announcement of the 3rd player for the Olympic team (Jan. 6, 2020). We'll probably know the results for the WR Race by Dec. 15 after the WTGF, so the top 2 WR players won't participate in the final stage of the trials. However, it's highly likely that the loser of the WR Race whether it be Ishikawa or Hirano will be forced to play the Domestic Trials on Dec. 21 to secure a place in the WTTC 2020 team since there is no guarantee that she would be selected to play in the Olympics as the 3rd player on Jan. 6, 2020. If that player doesn't participate in the Trials, and later on learns that she wasn't selected as the 3rd team member for the Olympics on Jan. 6, and also doesn't win the All-Japan National Championships, she may be left off the WTTC team entirely.
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