Hong Kong's Wong Chun-ting settles for bronze at Asian Table Tennis Championships
Hong Kong had to be content with two more bronze medals at the Asian Table Tennis Championships after losing semi-final clashes in Pattaya, Thailand, on Saturday.
Hong Kong had to be content with two more bronze medals at the Asian Table Tennis Championships after losing semi-final clashes in Pattaya, Thailand, on Saturday.
In the men's singles, up-and-coming Wong Chun-ting battled hard, but had to bow to second seed Xu Xin of China.
Wong, ranked 17th in the world, went down 4-1 after losing in five games (11-7, 11-2, 12-10, 10-12, 12-10).
Wong has proven he has the quality after a number of outstanding performances this year but mentally he is not consistent enough
Wong had raised hopes of claiming more scalps after routing South Korean Jang Woo-jin in straight games 4-0 in the quarter-finals, but mainlander Xu, one of the best players in the world, showed his class and proved too strong.
It was similar disappointment for Hong Kong in the women's doubles as Jiang Huajun and Tie Yana were beaten by Japan's Miu Hirano and Mima Ito 4-0 (11-6, 11-7, 11-9, 11-7).
With no play-off for the third place, Hong Kong collected two bronze medals despite the defeats.
This followed their women's team bronze earlier.
Coach Chan Kong-wah said Wong would need to be more focused mentally to become a real top-class player.
"Wong has proven he has the quality after a number of outstanding performances this year but mentally he is not consistent enough," said Chan.
"He also needs to improve his ability to play under pressure. He is still learning and this cannot happen without sufficient international exposure."
Xu said: "The last three games were very tight. [Wong] has changed his approach to go all out and fight. He has improved a great deal.
"I heard his goal for this tournament was to win a medal for his team and I'm happy that he achieved his goal.
"We interact a lot off the court, since we are two of the very few left using a pen-holding grip playing in the international arena."
Earlier this year on the world tour, Xu was successful in their second-round clash in Kuwait and in their quarter-final confrontation in Japan.
