Doha 2025 World Table Tennis Championships Preview: Highlights and Schedule, Who Can Break the Monopoly of National Table Tennis?

14/05/2025 14:12:00 baseball

The 2025 ITTF World Table Tennis Championships will be held in Doha, Qatar from May 17 to 25, and the Chinese table tennis team will be the defending champion to attack five individual champions. Who will be able to break the monopoly of the Chinese team?

The 2025 ITTF World Table Tennis Championships are scheduled for May 17-25

The 2025 ITTF World Table Tennis Championships are scheduled to take place from 17 to 25 May, the tournament's first return to Doha in 21 years since 2004. At the World Table Tennis Championships in Durban, South Africa two years ago, the Chinese team won five championships in men's singles, women's singles, men's doubles, women's doubles and mixed doubles. Since 2005, Chinese players have monopolized the men's and women's singles crowns at the World Table Tennis Championships for 20 consecutive years.

Austria's Werner Schrager won the men's singles championship at the World Table Tennis Championships in 2003 and is the only non-Chinese singles world champion in 20 years. But now the world table tennis landscape is quietly changing, and at last month's Macau Singles World Cup, Brazil's Hugo Calderano became the first American athlete to win the singles title of three major table tennis tournaments. Now he is in hot form, confident and determined, and will debut in Doha with a fresh spirit.

According to statistics, the competition brought together about 600 athletes from five continents to compete for the crown in five individual events. It is worth mentioning that due to the collective absence of the previous champions, the men's singles field will give birth to a new world champion; The reigning champions of the men's and women's doubles did not participate. Only Sun Yingsha will embark on the journey of defending the women's singles title, and will also work with Wang Chuqin to try to win the mixed doubles title for a second time.

Here's everything you need to know about the 58th World Table Tennis Championships, including the star players to watch and the schedule.

World Table Tennis Championships in Doha 2025: Star players to watch

Looking back at past events, the dominance of Chinese players or combinations in the World Table Tennis Championships can be called phenomenal: the men's singles has reached the top 13 times in the past 15 events, and the women's singles has won 22 championships in 23 events; Men's Doubles has won 14 times in the last 16 tournaments, Women's Doubles has won 22 times in 23 tournaments, and Mixed Doubles has won 19.5 championships (one multinational combination won the championship).

However, the men's singles field at this World Table Tennis Championships may change - with the absence of Olympic champions Ma Long, Fan Zhendong and other players, the Chinese team's dominance will be tested. At the Macau Singles World Cup that just ended last month, Brazilian player Hugo Calderano defeated a strong opponent as a dark horse: reversing the world's No. 2 king Chuqin in the semifinals, and defeating the world's No. 1 Lin Shidong in the final, announcing to the world: There is no absolute king in the men's singles championship battle.

This year's men's singles field can be called the "strongest challenger league in history", led by the current world No. 3 Brazilian star Hugo Calderano, and the world No. 4 Japanese men's singles "first brother" Tomokazu Zhangmoto; The French Lebrun brothers, with their younger brother Felix in sixth and Alexis in eighth; Olympic men's singles silver medallist Moregard from Sweden, and two German players who have been ranked in the world's top 10, Patrick Francesca and Qiu Dang.

In terms of the Chinese Army, Lin Shidong and Wang Chuqin are the top two seeds, at both ends of the draw table; Liang will be the No. 5 seed in the tournament.

The women's singles field is still dominated by Chinese players, with four women's players, Sun Yingsha, Wang Manyu, Chen Xingtong and Wang Yidi, among the top four seeds. However, their Asian opponents are already under siege: Japan's Miwa Haramoto (fifth), Hina Hayada (sixth), Satsuki Oto (seventh) and Misei Ito (eighth) are all in the top ten, while South Korea's Shin Yubin and Chinese Taipei's Jung Yijing should not be underestimated.

The smoke of the tournament has risen, who will rewrite history?