We are talking about the Olympic Gold Medalist and the Men’s World Cup winner, Zhang Jike. He is a Chinese Table Tennis player who recently jumped to the 76th position on the ITTF ranks, after participating in the Three Major Open tournaments.
Another big thing about this 30-years old guy is that he is the fourth player to achieve the Career Grand Slam. The first three players are Jan-Ove Waldner, Liu Guoliang, and Kong Linghui.
Why Zhang Jike must qualify for his upcoming Qualification Tournament?
The Seamaster 2018 ITTF is around the corner, and for Zhang to lock his presence for that game should compulsorily win at the preceding qualifying games. The preliminary games commence on 22nd May, and the major game is on 24th May.
Zhang is ranked on #1 position among all the Chinese Men’s team, and also the only guy to ever win the Men’s Singles Title. The other players who fall next to Zhang are Xu Chenhao, Zhou Yu; where Zhou has been a runner-up for three time and Chenhao bagged the second place at the 2013 Japan Open.
While others who are playing in the team are either the young newly joined ones or may have people who may have left the team already.
Coming to the qualifying rounds, all the other Chinese players along with Zhang are going to participate. These qualifying games are present even for the Double’s game, just like the Men’s Singles.
Many of the local audiences have an eye on Wong Chun Ting too, he is currently the top seed in the Men’s Single game. He is going to partner with Ho Kwan Kit for the Men’s Double game, and they are on the 3rd place on the seed. They are behind the Korean’s Jeoung Youngsik and Lee Sangsu who were the runners-up in Germany, this year itself.
We should also not forget two special names: Xu Haidong and Niu Guankai who are still playing and are there on the list. They are the surprise elements of the match!
Now, could Zhang Jike tackle all the world championship qualification tournament players and make it to the Seamaster 2018? We will surely find out!