The Biggest Olympic Table Tennis Upset of All Time – Truls Moregardh’s Magical Moment

World #26 Truls Moregardh defeated current world #1 Wang Chuqin in the men’s singles event of the 2024 Paris Olympics. Wang was by far the favorite to win the gold medal but he fell against Truls in what we believe is the biggest table tennis upset of all time. 

Truls Moregard convincingly defeated Wang Chuqin by 4 games to 2 (12-10, 11-7, 5-11, 7-11, 11-9, 11-6). 

In this article, I’m going to share my perspective about everything that transpired in this match, from Wang’s broken racket, Truls complaining about Wang’s illegal serves and getting a yellow card, analyze Truls’ gameplan and mentality, and more. 

The Day Before

The day before the biggest table tennis upset of all time, the overwhelming favorite to win the match won an Olympic gold medal.

You see, the match between Truls and Wang was a R32 match in the men’s singles event.

Before his match with Truls, Wang had already played 5 best of 7 matches: 4 in the mixed doubles event and one in the men’s singles event (the round of 64 against Wang Yang). Truls had only played one match.

There is an argument to be made that Wang Chuqin was already both physically and mentally exhausted from having played so many important matches in such a short period.

Team China tasked Wang with winning the mixed doubles event and he was also expected to win the men’s singles event. 

Many fans online argued that it’d have been better if they selected current world #3 Ma Long to play in the mixed doubles event so that Fan Zhendong and Wang Chuqin could focus solely on the men’s singles event, and I have to agree.

Coming back to the day before, Wang played the final of the Mixed Doubles event, which he won, together with Sun Yingsha.

This was a highly stressful match, which they won 4-2. Wang and Sun fulfilled their duty as Chinese representatives to win it all and they brought the gold medals back home, but something happened in the celebration that would affect the history of the sport forever.

After Wang and Sun won, they celebrated with the fans and their coaching team. However, it turns out that, in the rush of the moment, Wang Chuqin left his racket on the ground. 

One photographer rushed to take their pictures and accidentally stepped on Wang’s racket, destroying it on the spot. 

Wang looked visibly upset at the photographers and he even scolded them, but the damage was already done.

After the match, Wang said:

“At that moment, I lost control of my emotions a little. I couldn’t understand why the photographers would do that” 

“I guess they didn’t mean it. I can’t do anything now that it’s already happened. I believe I’ll still be able to play well with my backup bat. Maybe this is fate.“

I personally believe that Wang Chuqin playing with his spare racket truly made a difference, but probably not in the way that you imagine.

You see, professional players can ask for specific blade and rubber weights so that all of their rackets weigh almost exactly the same.

In addition, Chinese athletes, like most, if not all table tennis players, are known to boost their rubbers with special chemicals, called boosters, to improve the performance of their rubbers.

This booster evaporates as it’s used, and the effect only lasts for a number of days/weeks. 

Now, we don’t know how Wang prefers to use his rubbers, but if he was planning on using the same racket as the day before, he presumably had to use a newly boosted set of rubbers that he wasn’t intending on using on a different blade.

These newly boosted rubbers would definitely play differently from those he used the day before.

However, I don’t think it was about the racket’s performance, I think it was more of the psychological effect that using a different racket could’ve had on Wang.

Because of all the psychological and equipment-related factors, it’s completely logical to think that the breaking of the racket could have affected Wang.

When asked about his racket after losing, Wang said: “It did affect my mood at the moment yesterday, but it wasn’t the reason for losing, I made many mistakes today, which really led to the failure.”

In true Chinese fashion, Wang owned up to his performance and said that it was him, and not the racket, but only he knows how much it affected him.

The Match Itself

This match was very different from any of the other ones they had played before. 

Prior to this match, Wang and Truls had played each other 8 times. Wang had always won, usually by large margins.

Now, if you were in Truls’ shoes, and you had to play the #1 player in the world who’s beaten you 8 times in a row, it’d be very hard to believe you can win this time.

Truls’ coach Jorgen Persson recognized this, and he spoke about how important self-confidence is in professional table tennis: 

“Belief plays a big part when you see how much (the Chinese are) winning. It’s important that you always believe it’s possible. That’s what I’m trying to convey to my players.”

“It’s possible to beat them, but you have to play at your 110 percent” he added.

But, even if Truls believed that he could win, as he did, self-belief alone wouldn’t be enough. So, this time, Moregard came into the match with a different plan, paired with the aforementioned winning mentality.

“I stuck to my plan that I had, and I really believed in it. I continued even if I lost two sets in the middle. I played fantastic table tennis and it was really really good” he said.

And play fantastic table tennis he did, as he executed his plan to near perfection.

Truls can’t realistically play open rallies every point against the fastest and strongest player on Earth, so he had to gamble everything in the first shots of the rally to come out on top.

Throughout the whole match, Moregard dominated the short game and capitalized on every opportunity the serve and receive game granted him.

As a result, Truls was able to enter most rallies in an advantageous position.

Truls was able to defuse Wang’s attacks by dominating the short game, flicking his serves, opening up half-long balls with tons of spin, and changing up the placement of his shots.

He was able to receive Wang’s tricky serves, which are also, in my opinion, completely illegal (we also cover that controversial issue in our Paris 2024 Olympic Singles recap). 

Truls struggled to receive Wang’s serves at the beginning of the sixth game. He complained to the referees that he couldn’t see the ball when Wang served, as is required in the sport’s rules, and thus, he couldn’t read the spin on the serve properly.

He couldn’t return two illegal serves in a row and complained to the referees, who showed him a yellow card for time wasting. This was truly unjust, as Truls was right in his complaint.

Somehow Truls was able to maintain his focus and he carried on with his onslaught of attacks. 

As for Wang, he didn’t look as sharp, explosive, and precise as he usually does, presumably due to the pressure Truls’ unpredictable game exerted on him.

Wang could never really play open rallies consistently, which is his main strength, nor could he perform his usual 3rd and 5th ball attacks because of Truls’ plan on the receive.

In addition, Wang really struggled to counterloop Truls’ spinny attacks throughout the whole match.

But, what stuck out to me the most was the difference in body language between the two.

Truls looked completely immersed in the match. He was completely concentrated and playing as if it was the last match of his life.

Wang, on the other hand, looked as if he was playing a normal tournament match.

For Truls, this was the most important match of his career, and he marked the history of the sport forever. In contrast, if Wang had won nobody would be talking about this match.

I think this fact really made a difference. For one of the players, this match meant absolutely everything in the world, and, for the other, it was just another opponent to beat to get to the gold medal match.

What It Means for The History of The Sport

In this match, Truls Moregard broke a 20-year streak. For the past 20 years, two Chinese athletes reached the final of the men’s singles event and either won or placed second.

This is the first time since 2004 in which a non-Chinese athlete has reached the men’s singles final. The last time this happened, Ryu Seung-Min won the gold medal match against Wang Hao. 

In addition, Wang Chuqin won’t get the gold medal we all thought he would.

It’s not only that Wang is the world’s #1. As of writing this article, Wang is first with 7925 points, followed by Liang Jingkun with 4025, nearly half of Wang’s points! Wang has been one of the most dominant world #1s in the history of the sport.

This freak, surprise result suddenly gave players from every other nation belief that they could potentially snatch the gold medal. Truls’ victory proved that it is indeed possible to knock out the Chinese from the Olympics in the plastic ball era.

Before the year 2008, China wasn’t as dominant as they are now. In these last 20 years, we’ve had an all-Chinese final in both the men’s and women’s singles events. 

I believe other non-Chinese athletes will benefit from this match, as they’ll be able to analyze what Truls did to beat Wang and understand that if he can manage it, they also can.

Truls Moregard showed us that anything’s possible with hard work, self-belief, a winning gameplan, and a bit of luck.

UPDATE: Truls reached the Gold Medal match by beating Hugo Calderano in an entertaining Semi-Final. He played against Fan Zhendong, a player for whom the Olympic Gold was the only thing he hadn’t achieved in a glittering career. Ultimately, Fan was too strong and secured China’s ongoing streak of Olympic Gold medals in the Men’s Singles.