World number one, Ma Long.
The Asian Table Tennis Championships are held every two years and represent the Asia Table Tennis Union’s most significant tournament. This year’s event will see the highest number of participants ever with 112 male and 94 female players taking part. During the event over 100 volunteers will assist and free buses will run to the Macau East Asian Games Dome. The budget for the event is more than MOP$10 million and the television audience will consist of over 200 million families across 23 countries.
The participating teams will come from 28 countries and regions, including China, Japan, Hong Kong and Macau. The host city is sending 7 male and 7 female players to the tournament, but they will have a tough time beating the Chinese team. Amongst those in the Chinese team are the top three male and female players in the world: men’s number 1, 2 and 3 respectively Ma Long, Zhang Jike and Wang Hao, and women’s number 1, 2 and 3 respectively Ding Ning, Liu Shiwen and Guo Yan. Japan will send their best players Ai Fukuhara and Kasumi Ishikawa.
The singles and doubles competitions will be played by a knockout system, with singles matches best of 7 games and doubles matches best of 5 games.
Finals schedule:
Feb 25: Women’s team finals
Feb 26: Men’s team finals
Feb 28: Mixed doubles finals
Feb 29: Men’s doubles finals, women’s singles finals
Mar 1: Women’s doubles finals, men’s singles final
The Macau East Asian Games Dome is an enormous venue
Tickets are priced at MOP$50 for a single day pass or MOP$100 for a full pass to all eight days. Tickets went on sale today and are available through Kong Seng Ticketing Service or by visiting www.macauticket.com.
Sponsors of the event include Galaxy Entertainment Group and the Suncity Group.
For more information, visit the official website of the 20th Asian Table Tennis Championships at www.attc20.com.
For results as the finals are decided, please return to the World Gaming website, www.wgm8.com.
