A Quick Recap Of The Tokyo 2020 Olympic Table Tennis Results

The Olympics are, by far, the most important competition in table tennis. They are hosted every 4 years, so most athletes will have few chances (if any!) to shine on the biggest stage in the world. 

For many athletes, playing in the Olympics is the highlight of their careers, regardless of the result. After all, only 70 male and female athletes are able to participate every 4 years.

Even fewer are those who are skilled enough to win Olympic medals. These players are the ones who leave their mark forever in the history of the sport. 

Tokyo 2020 was a particularly special tournament, so let’s explore the reasons why.

Tokyo 2020 Olympic Events

Table tennis was introduced at the Olympics in 1988. The initial events were the men’s singles, men’s doubles, women’s singles, and women’s doubles events.

In 2008, the men’s and women’s doubles events were replaced by the men’s team and women’s team events.

Finally, the Tokyo 2020 Olympics introduced a new event: The mixed doubles event.

I believe that this final iteration of the Olympic events structure is by far the best we’ve ever had.

The team’s events provide a rare spectacle where we’re able to see each country compete as a team, instead of having one athlete represent each nation.

Adding the mixed doubles event in Tokyo was seen in a very positive light, and I also think it’s a very exciting and promising event.

Up until the Tokyo Olympics, both men and women only competed against athletes of the same gender. At Tokyo, however, we were able to see male and female athletes team up and play with and against each other.

In my opinion, this represented a huge positive step forward for Olympic table tennis.

Men’s Singles Event

The men’s singles event was a very exciting one, and it was probably the most important men’s singles event in the history of the sport.

In the semi-finals, Fan Zhendong (CHN) beat Lin Yun-Ju (TPE) 4-3, and Ma Long (CHN) beat Dimitrij Ovtcharov (GER), also 4-3. Both matches were absolute thrillers and I’d recommend you watch them if you have the chance.

Fan and Ma then clashed against each other in arguably the most important match of their careers up to that point.

If Fan Zhendong won, he would join the list of Olympic winners at the age of 24. 

Considering that he was an up-and-coming star and Ma Long was already 31 years old at the time, it looked like Fan was about to start his own era of dominance.

If he won the Olympic men’s singles event, he would probably have two more chances to win it at the ages of 27 and 31 in 2024 and 2028, respectively. 

If Ma Long won, then he would establish himself as the undisputed greatest player of all time, and he did. 

Ma Long is generally considered to be the best player of all time because (alongside his plethora of records and achievements) he’s the only player to have won 2 Olympic men’s singles events.

In the end, Ma Long bested Fan Zhendong by 4 games to 2, in a game full of loops and counterloops. 

Ma Long 🇨🇳 vs Fan Zhendong 🇨🇳 | Men’s Singles Table Tennis 🏓 Gold Medal Match | Tokyo Replays

As for the third and fourth place match, Dima Ovtcharov earned a well-deserved Olympic bronze medal, as he beat Lin Yun-Ju 4-3.

Women’s Singles Event

The women’s singles event was just as important, although for slightly different reasons.

In contrast to the men’s singles, the semi-finals were not even close as the two Chinese representatives won their matches 4-0. Chen Meng beat Singapore’s Yu Mengyu and Sun Yingsha beat Japan’s Mima Ito.

In addition, both Chinese players only won the minimum 44 points needed to win each match, as none of the matches had a game in which their opponent even reached 10 points.

In the final match, an established 27-year-old world #1 in the form of Chen Meng was to face an up-and-coming generational talent, the 20-year-old attacker, Sun Yingsha.

If Chen Meng won, she would be able to write her name in the history books, and, if Sun Yingsha won, she would start her Olympic career in spectacular fashion, giving her many, many chances to become the GOAT in the sport.

In the end, Chen beat Sun in a closely contested match by 4 games to 2.

As for Mima Ito, she placed third and won a much-deserved Olympic bronze medal after beating Yu Mengyu 4-1.

Men’s Team Event 

In both team events, China is always by far the favorite to win. In fact, they had never lost any team event leading up to the Tokyo Olympics. Their only goal is to maintain that perfect record.

And that, they did. Speaking of perfect record, they didn’t lose a single match in the whole men’s team event. They won every round 3-0.

In the semi-finals, team China was to play team South Korea, and team Japan had to play against team Germany.

As we said before, China won 3-0. As for Japan and Germany, it was an absolute thriller, as they went to the fifth and deciding match.

Patrick Franziska and Timo Boll won the doubles match 3-2, Harimoto beat Ovtcharov 3-1, Boll beat Mizutani 3-1 and Harimoto beat Franziska 3-2. All of these were very close and exciting matches.

In the final match, Dima Ovtcharov beat Koki Niwa 3-0, earning the Germans a spot in the final.

The final saw Team China playing against Team Germany, and China won very comfortably.

Xu Xin and Ma Long won the doubles match 3-0, Fan Zhendong beat Dima Ovtcharov 3-2, and Ma Long beat Timo Boll 3-1. At moments it felt like Germany could have threatened the Chinese team, but the Chinese athletes showed up when it mattered the most and took every match.

As for the third-place match, Japan beat Korea 3-1 in what was also a fairly one-sided match.

Women’s Team Event

The women’s team event was even more one-sided than the men’s team event. China won every single match, and none of them went to the deciding game. They won every single individual match 3-0 or 3-1.

The semi-final match-ups were China vs Germany and Japan vs Hong Kong where both China and Japan won 3-0.

In the final, China beat Japan relatively comfortably. Chen Meng and Wang Manyu beat Kasumi Ishikawa and Miu Hirano 3-1 in the doubles match, and then Sun Yingsha beat Mima Ito 3-1 in the first singles match.

In the third and last singles match, China showed why they are by far the strongest nation in the world. 

Wang Manyu beat Miu Hirano 11–5, 11–9, 11–3, giving China yet another gold medal.

As for the third-place match, Hong Kong beat Germany 3-1.

Mixed Doubles Event

As we said before, the mixed doubles event was introduced at this edition of the Olympics, and it looks like it’s here to stay.

One advantage of the mixed doubles event is that 16 doubles pairings compete from 16 nations. This means that China can only send 1 doubles pairing to this event, which, in turn, means that the other nations have a much higher chance of winning.

Now, we don’t have anything against China, but, before these Olympics, the last time any other nation won a gold medal at the Olympics had been in 2004. Before that, the only time a non-Chinese nation won a gold medal was in 1992.

In fact, out of the 32 gold medals awarded before the Tokyo Olympics, only 4 were won by athletes not from China. That makes it very exciting when other countries have a chance at winning an event.

The teams that reached the semi-finals were China, France, Japan, and Chinese Taipei.

To reach the semi-final, though, France and Japan had to win two insane matches in the quarter-finals.

France (Emmanuel Lebesson and Jia Nan Yuan) beat Hong Kong (Wong Chun-ting and Doo Hoi Kem) 13-11 in the 7th game.

An even more impressive match was Japan (Mima Ito and Jun Mizutani) vs Germany (Petrissa Solja and Patrick Franziska).

The Japanese pairing came back from being 3-2 down to win 16-14 in the seventh.

As for the semi-final matches, they weren’t too closely contested. China (Xu Xin and Liu Shiwen) beat France 4-0, and Japan beat Chinese Taipei (Lin Yun-ju and Cheng I-ching) 4-1.

The final match between China and Japan was nothing short of incredible.

China took the first two games and Japan answered back, winning the three following games. China then won the sixth game. In a historic upset, Japan were able to seize the seventh game and win Japan’s first-ever Olympic gold medal in table tennis.

Jun Mizutani and Mima Ito were the only non-Chinese athletes to win a gold medal in this edition of the Olympic games, and they were the first ones to win since 2004.

In the third-place match, team Chinese Taipei won the bronze medal after beating France 4-0.

Best Players at The Tokyo Olympics

Having gone over all of the results, we were able to highlight the 5 athletes who performed best in the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.

Ma Long

Ma Long had the tournament of his life, as he won two Olympic medals (men’s singles and men’s team), which solidified his position as the best male table tennis player of all time.

Chen Meng

Chen Meng also won two Olympic gold medals (women’s singles and women’s team) and she was able to write her name in the history books of the sport.

Mima Ito 

Mima Ito had a spectacular tournament, winning the gold medal in the mixed doubles event, a silver medal in the women’s team event, and a bronze medal in the women’s singles event. 

Mima was undoubtedly the best non-Chinese athlete in these Olympics.

Dimitrij Ovtcharov

Dima Ovtcharov also had a great run at these Olympics as he won a silver medal in the men’s team event, and a bronze medal in the men’s singles event.

Jun Mizutani

Jun Mizutani retired straight after the Olympics because of his increasing sight difficulties, but he was able to leave professional table tennis play on a high note, as he won gold in the mixed doubles event, and bronze in the men’s team event.