2021 Olympics Fan Guide: Everything you need to know about table tennis

Table tennis could become your new summer obsessions at the 2021 Olympics. Here’s everything you need to know to dive in to this fast-paced sport.

I was fortunate enough to be on the ground in Rio reporting at the 2016 Summer Olympics as an intern with the Olympic News Service. Table tennis was one of the sports I was assigned to cover. It was my introduction to the sport at a competitive level. I quickly learned two things: 1. A sport that most Americans tend to think of as a leisure activity is taken very seriously in other parts of the world. 2. NEVER call it ping-pong.

2021 Olympics: Table tennis athletes and teams to know

If you familiarize yourself with one aspect of international table tennis prior to the Games, make it the Chinese National Team. They are the monolith of the sport. At the last Olympics, they won all four gold medals and half of the total medals up for grabs. Overall, they have won 28 of the 32 gold medals since the sport’s introduction at the 1988 Olympics. Dominant is an understatement.

Just making the team is a cutthroat process. Countries are only allowed two entries into the singles tournament. According to the most recent International Table Tennis Federation world rankings, the top four men’s and seven of the top 10 women’s players hail from China, which means legitimate superstars of the sport are left with spot duty in the team competition. The reigning women’s world champion, Liu Shiwen, missed out on a spot in the singles competition to Chen Meng and Sun Yingsha, the top two ranked players in the world.

The men’s side will feature the world’s top-ranked player, Fan Zhendong, and reigning gold medalist Ma Long, often referred to as the GOAT of table tennis, in the singles competition.

The host country will provide China’s biggest competition. In the singles competition, Japan will be sending out Ito Mima and Ishikawa Kasumi (ranked third and ninth in the world, respectively) for the women’s tournament and Harimoto Tomokazu (ranked fifth) and Jun Mizutani for the men’s. Mizutani earned the Bronze in the singles competition in 2016, the first countryman to ever medal for Japan.

2021 Olympics: Table tennis rules in 280 characters:

Traditionally, at least since 2008 when the team competitions were introduced and the gendered doubles events were eliminated, there are four table tennis competitions at the Olympics: Men’s and Women’s Singles and Men’s and Women’s Team. This year, they have added a mixed doubles competition.

As for the actual gameplay, each game is played to 11, with singles matches being a best-of-seven and doubles matches being best-of-five. Players alternate service after every two serves. And you must win by two. All these rules apply to doubles matches, aside from the addendum that you must alternate who returns the ball.

2021 Olympics: The peak experience in table tennis

With all due respect to the fierce competition that is the team tournament, the singles competition is where the peak table tennis experience can be found at the Olympics. The team matches can last up to four hours and regularly clock in at two-plus, whereas the singles matches are shorter and feature the more exciting storylines.

Ma Long’s quest to cement his GOAT status by earning back-to-back gold medals will be fascinating to watch, as will the potential of the first-ever medalist outside of Asia or Europe. Brazilian Hugo Calderano, currently ranked sixth in the world on the men’s side, became the first Latin American to ever crack the top 10 of the ITTF list. Adriana Diaz, currently ranked 18th at just 20 years old, became the first-ever women’s tennis player from Puerto Rico to qualify for the Olympics in 2016.

For a fun storyline on the team side, check out 40-year-old Timo Boll who is back once again to try and lead Germany’s men’s squad to the podium for the fourth consecutive Olympics.