You don't live in China, do you. Basketball is no way near #1. Soccer is, and has been the dominating sports for the past 10 years. Compared to Barcelona, Real Madrid, Maradona's visit to China, Jordan/TMAC/Lebron/Ming made no sound there. Pingpong is a once-a-while story because of the world championship. However soccer is the all-time hottest. In China, how many people stay up all night watching for NBA games/finals? How many stay up all night watching for Fifa WC games? How many online communities dedicated to each sports? How many magazines/publishings for each? What's the most popular searched term on the web? "soccer" or "basketball"? We all know the answers, quit kidding yourself, buddy.
Um no. The reason people seemingly don't "follow" ping pong is because its results are predictable. China wins about 88% of all the important competitions in the world. How did I get that number? Well: 1) China won 6 out of 7 WC events for the last 3 World Championships, all 7 the one before that. So any given year I'd guess that China wins 6 of 7. 2) They won 3 of 4 Olympic events. The one they lost in 2004 (men's singles) was considered a huge shock. The one before that they won all 4. So any given year with Olympics, they win 3 of 4 (at least). 3) They won both men's and women's World Cup last year and that trend basically holds except very very intermittent years. That's 2 of 2 4) They won all four ITTF Pro Tour Grand Prix last year. The only time they lose if they don't send their best players or they severly underperform. Mind you, it is possible for them to win under 88% any given year, but I'm not betting against it. In fact, I'd probably bet a higher %. With such results, basically there isn't much room for doubt who wins any given competition. Why would you bother watching every game when you know who's gonna win? The Chinese league plays at a higher (MUCH higher) level than the Olympics. But just wait until the you are in the semi-finals/finals of the WC/Olympics where not every player left is Chinese. Oh boy do people follow it, because Chinese pride is on the line. You'd hear talk like the rest of the world is catching up in experience, technique, what have you. However, viewership has nothing to do with popularity. Soccer is somewhat of an urban event. You go to the farms and you'd have much fewer people playing it. But ping pong is played EVERYWHERE. You go to a tiny village in the poor Sichuan mountains and you'd find people playing ping pong. What to start a conversation with a stranger while waiting for the plane? Start by saying something like "boy, the men's ping pong team sure f*cked up on singles event in the Olympics didn't they?" There IS no doubt what's the #1 sport in China. People play it more, people care about it more, people ***** and complain about it more when they lose and feel it is an embarrassment. No other sport ANYWHERE in the world enjoys that kind of popularity. Ping pong is the national sport and ALWAYS will be the national sport.
wow thats pitiful. i was first wondering what the thread title meant when it said "98:10" i thought it was a time or something. I would have never thought it was a score. Man they could have made more points had they just chucked the ball from half court every time.
After losing to Korea by 44 points, the Saudi coach made some comments about how good the Korean's were, how he thought the Chinese team wasn't very impressive, and how the Koreans can beat the Chinese. He should have kept his mouth shut.
I guess the Chinese team took it to heart when the SA coach made that comment. Don't u usually slack off a bit when u r leading by a large portion?
cctv-5 is showing the game right now, in case someone wants to see how the hell 98:10 happened. use pplive you can watch online.
OK, since I lived in Saudi for a while, let me inform people here that Saudi soccer is very high-level as far as Asian futbol is concerned (I know, I know, Asia is the weakest continent out there pretty much, so we are not exactly talking about European/Latin Americans/African soccer here). When I lived in Saudi during the late 1980s through the early 1990s, it was the hayday of Saudi soccer. There was some GREAT soccer to watch. The local Saudi league was a very competitive and enjoyable one to watch. They had clubs like Al-Shabab, Al-Helal, Al-Ahly, and Al-Nasr. They had some very good soccer talent at the time, some of whom took part in that 1994 WC tournament. The Saudis are very proud of their soccer team, and as far as their b-ball team is concerned, they probably don't even know they have one! Nowadays, the Saudi national team is a bit lacking in talent, but still they are almost a lock to the WC every four years, so they probably have the best soccer legacy of all Asian clubs. I don't know if the Chinese would trade their basketball team (Which is mediocre even with Yao) for the Saudi soccer team (which even during 'bad times' is still easily one of the top clubs in Asia), but that would make for an interesting discussion in the Hangout (hint, hint! )
Have you heard such a thing as a hyperbole? Oh I'm sorry, not everybody follows ping pong, just 90% of them.
