Tournaments

Rio 2016 Olympic Games

20 Mar 2017

The team was written off before the final started as simply being too old; the Swedish trio of Peter Karlsson, Jörgen Persson and Jan-Ove Waldner was given little chance against the outfit comprising Kong Linghui, Liu Guoliang and Liu Guozheng in the gold medal contest at the 2000 World Team Championships in Kuala Lumpur.

Incredibly with Ulf Carlsson sitting courtside, a three-two win for the Nordic country was posted.

Jun Mizutani is in peak form (Photo: Rémy Gros)

by Ian Marshall, ITTF Publications Editor

Notably Jörgen Persson beat both Kong Linghui and Liu Guoliang to prove the backbone of his team’s success.

Jan-Ove Waldner

However was not the key to victory the performance of Jan-Ove Waldner; in the first match of the fixture he beat Liu Guoliang, now the head coach of the Chinese Men’s Team and the man who will sit courtside for the final of the Men’s Team event at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games on the evening of Wednesday 17^th August.

Jan-Ove Waldner beat Liu Guoliang for the very first time in his career; the important fact is that it put the Chinese Team under pressure.