Teenage paddler Lin stuns world champion Xu in Olympic simulation competition
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E-mail Xinhua, May 3, 2021
XINXIANG, China, May 3 (Xinhua) -- 16-year-old paddler Lin Shidong surprisingly rallied past world champion Xu Xin in the Chinese team's Olympic simulation competition that commenced here on Monday.
Lin, who had been crowned in national junior championships last December, recorded a stunning 8-11, 13-11, 12-10, 6-11, 11-9 victory over world second-ranked Xu in men's singles first round of the group stage.
"I came into this match with a mindset of challenging him. I just hoped to put out what I had trained into the match," said Lin.
Other star paddlers Ma Long, Fan Zhendong and Lin Gaoyuan overcame opponents to kick off their campaign in Xinxiang, central China's Henan Province.
Women's singles group matches witnessed no surprise, as Chen Meng, Sun Yingsha, Wang Manyu and Liu Shiwen all won their opening round matches.
36 men's and women's players apiece are vying in singles matches. They are divided in eight groups for each category and play in a round robin.
The singles group matches continue on Tuesday.
In mixed doubles, world No. 1 Fan Zhendong and his partner Qian Tianyi lost to choppers Ma Te and Liu Fei in straight sets.
"We haven't played many matches against two choppers before. We didn't lay out specific tactics after the draw and just adjusted ourselves while playing, but it was a bit slow," admitted Fan.
Ma thought that special playing style keyed their victory. "Other players didn't play quite many matches against paddlers in this style. We played well today, and combined chopping with attacking smoothly," he said.
As an added event of table tennis at the Tokyo Olympic Games, mixed doubles feature one pair from each association, signaling little room for making mistakes for every Olympic participant.
Mixed doubles event of the ongoing Olympic simulation competition features a total of 16 pairs.
Top seeds and world champions Xu Xin/Liu Shiwen sailed past Yu Ziyang/Chen Yi in straight sets. Second-seeded Liang Jingkun and Sun Yingsha reached the last eight with a same scoreline. Enditem
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