At the time the players were just beginning to get used to the new ball, some players couldn't handle it at all, it really didn't suit their style. There were a lot of unforced errors and questionable plays. Now we are about a year from the introduction of the plastic ball and perhaps things are starting to look up a little. Sure at club level and even national level we still kind of hate them. But the real question is, are they more entertaining to watch?
I watched a lot of the 2015 Qoros World Table Tennis Championships and there were some stunning rallies. Some of them I would say were up there with the better rallies I have seen. This world championships had many great matches. Lee Sang Su played incredibly against Ovtcharov and there were plenty of good rallies in that match and also Jung Youngsik against Mizutani which may have been the most rally-packed match I have seen in a while.
How much of the WTTC did you watch? Did you think the rallies were more entertaining than usual? The same as with the old ball?
One thing is for sure, the international players are starting to get a good feel for the new ball and they are looking as unstoppable as ever. The DHS Top 10 Video from ITTF from the tournament had some truly spectacular points and we saw some amazing power demonstrated by the players, notably Ma Long and Fang Bo. The new ball has not crushed our spirits entirely and we are finding that it is relatively playable.
One thing I didn't see much of was breakages. I don't think I saw a breakage of a ball in a livestream match during the tournament. Did anyone see many balls break?
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I didn't see hardly any breakages, come to think of it. definitely less than with Celluloid balls.
ReplyDeleteAlso from what i saw the new ball isn't offering any advantage or disadvantage to choppers. The status quo remains the same.