Today was the final day of action at the ITTF World Youth Championships in Cluj Napoca, Romania. China claims wins in six of the fourteen events, with Japan winning three, Taipei and Germany winning a pair and Thailand winning the remaining event.
The U19 Boys Team event went to Japan. Taipei were the second seeds and they defeated China in the quarter-finals 3-1 before falling 2-3 to India. Japan, for its part, had little trouble with Korea in their semi-final (won 3-1) and then rolled past India 3-0.
U19 Boys played Japan/China matches in both semi-finals. Japan won both matches, after which Ryuusei Kawakami won the final against Kazuki Yoshiyama 4-2. The top players in these events are not always the best players at that age (sometimes 17 or 18 year olds move up to the professional tour ranks and stop competing in youth events). That said, these are great results for Japan as Kawakami wins at just 16 years old.
Wales’ Anna Hursey reached the semi-finals, but otherwise the U19 Girls Singles event was dominated by China. Hursey lost to the eventual winner, Qin Yuxuan. And number two Zong Geman defeated Japan’s Yuna Ojio in the other semi-final. Qin won 4-2 in the Final.
Interestingly, the U19 doubles results and teams were not as expected. U19 Boys’ Doubles went to Taipei’s team of Kuo and Hsu, who defeated the Japanese team of Kawakami and Yoshiyama (who had finished first and second in the singles). The same goes for the girls’ U19 doubles, where the first and second place singles (Zong/Qin) lost to Anna Hursey of Wales and Mia Griesel of Germany. The mixed doubles went to a Chinese Li/Qin pair in charge of Romania’s Iulian Chirita, who partnered Anna Hursey. The U19 Teams events followed the pattern established in the singles, with Japan winning U19 Boys and China winning U19 Girls.
Taipei won the U15 Boys Teams with a 3-2 win over Italy. Both finalists were a surprise, as Taipei had to upset Iran and then upset top-seeded Korea to reach the final, and Italy had to first upset Romania, then upset Japan, then upset China. Ultimately, in the Battle of Cinderellas, it was Taipei who won 3-2.
It was an all-China final in the U15 Boys Singles event, with Yu Haiyang beating Zhou Guanhong 4-2. Germany’s Koharu Itagaki won the girls U15 singles with a 4-2 victory over China’s Zhu Qihui. China won both the boys and girls U15 doubles, with Zhou/Yu winning the boys and Zhu/Liu the girls. Thailand’s only win at the event came in the mixed doubles, where Thitaphat Preechayan and Kulapassr Vijitviriyagul defeated the top-seeded Chinese side in the semi-final before defeating another Chinese side (Yu/Zhu) 3-2 in the final. In the U15 Girls Teams, Japan topped second-seeded China in the semi-finals before beating top-seeded Republic of South Korea 3-1 in the final.
Results for Americans varied, with Nandan Naresh recording the only American win in any of the U19 events (he was 1 of 2, losing 4–3 to Benyamin Faraji in the round of 16 of the U19 Boys Singles). Abigail Yu won her opening match in the U15 Girls Singles before falling to Germany’s Josephina Neumann in the round of 16. Kef Noorani and Irene Yeoh had a solid performance in the U15 Mixed Doubles event, losing 1-3 to a Thai pair in the quarter-finals.
TeamUSA’s U15 teams both reached the quarterfinals. TeamUSA’s U15 Boys team defeated Germany 3-1 before falling to Korea. TeamUSA U15 Girls won their opening match against host Romania 3-1 before falling to Team China in the quarterfinals.
The world will turn its attention back to the pros in ten days’ time as the next big event is the WTT Finals Hong Kong, starting on December 10.
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