In the first round of the WTT Taiyuan regular season, there was a remarkable match between China and South Korea in the first round of the men's singles. This was the match between Xiang Peng and Li Shangzhu. It was also a group with relatively close strength in the first round. The world ranking gap between the two people was not big, and their level was also between the two. However, Li Shangzhu's international competition experience is obviously much better than that of Xiang Peng, and he is also older, so he really takes advantage of this aspect.
Lee Sung soo is a typical Korean player. His forehand ability is very strong, and he is good at attacking the first three boards after serving. Xiang Peng is just the opposite of him. In fact, Xiang Peng has always been a very hardworking player, and his basic skills are very solid, but he may be relatively limited in talent. He is better at playing stalemate with opponents, So this game is a rhythm war. It depends on whether Li Shangzhu can finish a round in the first three boards, or whether Xiang Peng can withstand the opponent's attack in the first three boards, enter the rhythm that he is better at, find the weakness of the opponent's backhand position, and then smash the opponent.
The first three games can be said that the process is very fast. After the two get their own rhythm, the opponent has no power to fight back, so the difference between the two sides in the first three games is more than 6 points. However, Xiang Peng's experience is relatively shallow after all. So Li Shangzhu had a 2-1 lead in the first three games. The score difference of the first three innings is very big, 11:3, 11:4, 11:5.
Since the fourth game, both sides have entered the state of competition. At this time, the competition is about who can win the key ball. On the edge of being eliminated, Xiang Peng has played a very big potential. He bit the fourth game and dragged the game into the final game. However, in the final game, Xiang Peng was completely suppressed by Li Shangzhu in terms of both competition experience and indomitable fighting style. It was a pity that Li Shangzhu was defeated in the final game. This time, Xiang Peng was not totally unproductive. For example, when he was in his relatively weak backhand position, he could clearly feel that his progress was great. In many cases, Xiang Peng lacked experience. I still have a little confidence.
For the Chinese men's team, Li Shangzhu has become the biggest killer of the Chinese team in the past six months. Since the second half of last year, Li Shangzhu has become the number one enemy of the Chinese men's team. He has defeated Fan Zhenzhong, who was still the first in the world at that time, in the Frankfurt Champions League. After entering 2024, he has won three consecutive victories against the national table tennis players. Ma Long was defeated in the team competition of the World Table Tennis Championships. Singapore Grand Slam let Lin Gaoyuan experience a round of tour. Now, after coming to Taiyuan, Xiang Peng has another round of tour. In half a year, he has won four consecutive national table tennis players, and three of them are main players of national table tennis. I have to say that Li Shangzhu really wants to attract the attention of our Chinese men's table tennis team, because his state of mind during the period before the Olympic Games is really excellent.
You can count them carefully. After entering the cycle of the Paris Olympic Games, is there any other player from the Foreign Association who can make such brilliant achievements in the face of Chinese players, especially many main players? So although Li Shangzhu is older, he may not have much room for improvement, but he can play so forcefully every time he meets Chinese players. We really should study the reason.
