India hoping for a medal from Mystery Woman

Wonder if a mystery woman can bring a gold medal for India at the London Olympics?

Olympic Table Tennis Quarter finals today!

Photo Courtesy telegraph.co.uk

After some exciting upsets and fast paced matches, the Men's singles competition is about to proceed to the medal round right after the Quarterfinals.
The draw looks like this-
(Courtesy www.ITTF.com)

Zhang Jike scraped past Samsonov. Wang Hao is in good form. Ovtcharov seems to be the most impressive. His match against Maze will attract a lot of attention since they are pretty much close.

ZHANG Jike CHN
0   10:00 - 1/8/2012 - Table 1	-: --- ---
JIANG Tianyi HKG
OVTCHAROV Dimitrij GER
0   21:00 - 31/7/2012 - Table 1	-: --- ---
MAZE Michael DEN
CRISAN Adrian ROU
0   20:00 - 31/7/2012 - Table 1	-: --- ---
CHUANG Chih-Yuan TPE
KISHIKAWA Seiya JPN
0   11:00 - 1/8/2012 - Table 1	-: --- ---
WANG Hao CHN

William Henzel is unlucky at the London Olympics

William Henzell of Australia lost to Table Tennis legend Vladimir Samsonov very narrowly 4-3 in the round of 32 at the London Olympic games in London.

Earlier, he beat Adam Pattantyus of Hungary and upset Joao Monteiro of Portugal to advance.

Bill Gates puts Ariel Hsing in the limelight!

Tech genius, Bill Gates, indirectly made sure that the world media's attention was firmly focused on Ping Pong player Ariel Hsing of the USA. Bill follows Table Tennis along with his close pal, Warren Buffet.

Ariel advanced to the round of 32 after beating Silva Yadira of Mexico 4-0 and then upsetting Ni Xialian of Luxemburg. Xialian is a former world champion, now a veteran. The win was quite unexpected. The biggest achievement for Ariel was troubling the no. 2 seed, Li Xiaoxia even though she eventually lost 2-4. Ariel won a lot of hearts and in particular Bill Gates' heart, who was thoroughly impressed with her performance.

Ariel plays at the ICC in Milpitas under the watchful eyes of Rajul Sheth.

Kerala Ranking tournament at Ambalamedu August 3-5

Kerala Star Maria Rony

A Table Tennis tournament will be held at FACT, Ambalamedu, Kerala from August 3-5, 2012. 

We request readers to write to us and provide more information.

India Table Tennis at Olympics: Soumyajit loses

Update:


Soumyajit lost after a decent fight against the much higher ranked opponent 4-1

Soumyajit to play Kim Hyok Bong of PRK in the second round

Photo courtesy: Sportsnewsnow.co.uk

India's only male representative in Table Tennis, Soumyajit Ghosh faces Kim Hyok Bong of PRK in the Men's singles round two in the London Olympics today (3:30 PM Indian Standard Time)

In the first round, Soumyajit beat Brazilian Gustavo Tsuboi 4-2.

Soumyajit Ghosh, Ankita Das live Olympic Games Table Tennis on DD Sports/ESPN

Soumyajit Ghosh and Ankita Das, London Olympic Games Table Tennis LIVE from London on DD Sports/ESPN at 8:30 Indian Standard Time!

Editor

Damien Eloi with a strange racket

Damien Eloi. Look at his blade carefully. See anything interesting?

Editor

Table Tennis Backhand Stroke

Dmitry Ovtcharov demonstrating the backhand loop stroke

Here are some good resources for developing good basic backhand strokes and also some on advanced Backhand techniques.

The commonly employed strokes on the backhand side are the following:

Backhand Push
Backhand Counter
Backhand Topspin
Backhand Loop
Backhand Chop 

By far the most common among amateur to semi-professional level is the backhand counter hit.