Table tennis is our national sport, and our neighbor Japan also has good results in this regard. Many Japanese players will come to China for training when they were young, so players from the two countries have more exchanges, and many Japanese players are well known and liked by us.
From this point of view, Fukuhara Ai is definitely the most likeable baby face. His standard Northeastern dialect has shortened the distance with Chinese fans. As a former leader in Japanese table tennis, she did not achieve very good results in front of the powerful Chinese team.
often cries after games, which has become a major characteristic of her. After retiring in 2018, we can no longer see the lovely Ai Jiang in the table tennis arena. It was also that year that a newcomer in Japanese table tennis was gradually gaining a foothold in the national team. This person was Hina Hayata .
As a standard post-00s generation, she has been growing up in a low-key manner under the aura of her predecessors, including Ai Fukuhara and Mima Ito. The burden on her is still very heavy. Fukuhara Ai has led the team to participate in four Olympic Games, but her best result in women's singles is fourth, and the best result in Japan's entire table tennis history is third place (bronze medal).
In the women's table tennis singles semifinals at the Paris Olympics, Hina Hayata lost to Sun Yingsha 0 to 4. She cannot help the Japanese team compete for the gold medal, but she still has a chance to win a bronze medal, which will also surpass Ai Fukuhara and create a new history of her own.
Fukuhara Ai’s best singles result in the Olympics was achieved in the 2016 Olympics, which was also her last Olympics. In that year, Hina Hayata won the women's singles and women's doubles championships at the ittf Australian Open and the ittf finals. In the next two years, he won the Open and World Tour titles again. The winning opponents were all Chinese teams, including Sun Yingsha.
But in singles, Hina Hayata has no record of defeating Sun Yingsha. Hina Hayata herself likes Sun Yingsha very much and hopes to learn more and communicate with her. She once applied to train with Sun Yingsha during the competition. After seeking Sun Yingsha's opinion, the two started training together. After the game, she said she learned a lot.
Hina Hayata, who is humble and studious, has quickly improved her grades. At the Hangzhou Asian Games, it was Hina Hayata who helped Japanese women's table tennis reach the finals again after 29 years. Therefore, there are still great expectations for her in this Olympics. If you want to win the championship, you won't have such unrealistic ideas.
But getting a medal is still a rush for Japanese players. Just like Ai Fukuhara said before, she dare not talk about winning the championship in front of the Chinese team. Even Zhang Benzhi and said they dare not talk about winning the table tennis in the Olympic Games. Although they have this idea, there is the Chinese team in front of them.
Hina Hayata’s opponent in the bronze medal match was Shin Yubin from South Korea. This player won the gold medal in the women’s doubles at the Hangzhou Asian Games last year, and his strength cannot be underestimated. If Hina Hayata wants to win a medal, she still needs to go all out.
Such a cute face will become the new favorite of Chinese fans. I wonder if she will be like Fukuhara Ai, who will cry excitedly after the game if she wins the bronze medal. Her "shortcoming" is that she cannot speak Chinese well.I don’t know if Sun Yingsha gave her any pointers again after losing to Sun Yingsha, but she also had a slight injury. I hope it won’t affect Hina Hayata’s third place match.
