Though they put up a spirited effort, Singapore’s women’s table tennis team couldn’t secure a trip to the semi-finals, losing 3-0 to the reigning champions from China in the Tokyo Olympics on Tuesday (3 August).
Singapore’s Lin Ye and Yu Mengyu battled China’s Chen Meng and Wang Manyu in the first team match, going down after 23 minutes in straight games.
Looking to even out the score, Feng Tianwei took on world number 3 Sun Yingsha in the singles event. However, she was unable to make it past the singles silver medallist and lost in straight games as well.
In the second singles event, Singapore’s Lin Ye faced off with China’s Wang Manyu who is ranked 4th in the world. Looking to put a dent in the opposing team’s streak, Lin managed to snag a shocking win in the first game with a score of 11-6.
However, Wang managed to overcome the first defeat and took down Lin in the next three games for a 3-1 win. This gave china an overall 3-0 victory against Singapore in the team event.
In the past, Singapore bagged a bronze in 2008 and a bronze in 2012 in the women’s team event. However, China has managed to defend its gold medal in this event since it was introduced into the games at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
China faces Germany next in the semi-finals on Wednesday (4 August). Germany beat South Korea 3-2 earlier.
