Fan Zhendong

On 5 May, the 52nd Team World Table Tennis Championships kicked off the men's team finals in Tokyo, Japan.

In the end, the Chinese team defeated its opponent with a big score of 3-1 and won the men's team championship of this World Table Tennis Championships.

Fan Zhendong also became the world champion by virtue of this competition, and won the world championship at the age of 17 years and 103 days, surpassing Ma Long who won the world championship at the age of 17 years and 8 months, becoming the youngest world champion in the history of men's table tennis.

In January, he won the Dubai World Cup men's team championship with Zhang Jike, Ma Long, Xu Xin and Fang Bo[5].

Fan Zhendong (born 22 January 1997) is a Chinese professional table tennis player.

After joining the Chinese National Table Tennis Team in 2012 as the youngest member of the team, he went on to become the youngest ITTF World Tour Champion and the youngest World Table Tennis Champion.

Winning 24 games, Fan Zhendong broke the table tennis Super League record of 23 games won by Ma Long in 2012.

In June, Fan Zhendong won the men's singles championship at the ITTF Tour Japan Open.

It is worth mentioning that in the quarter-finals with French player Simon Gauzy, Fan Zhendong hit a "magic save".

This "magic save" not only made Fan Zhendong's popularity soar, but also won the title of "Best Score of the Year" at the ITTF awards ceremony at the end of the year.

On 8 March, in the final round of the World Table Tennis Championships in Dusseldorf held in Shenzhen, Fan Zhendong defeated Xu Xin 2-0, ranking first with 9 wins and 2 losses, and won the first Dusseldorf title.

For tickets to the Seldorf World Table Tennis Championships, Malone, who also has 9 wins and 2 losses, can only be ranked second (because Fan Zhendong won the previous match against Malone).

On 12 April, he won the men's team championship at the Asian Table Tennis Championships.

On 3 January 2013, the Chinese table tennis team went straight to Paris for the first time

Fan In the first stage of the competition, Fan who was only 16 years old, defeated many famous players and won an unexpected second place, thus becoming the biggest dark horse.

From 15 to 19 January, in the second stage of the Chinese men's table tennis selection that went directly to Paris, Fan Zhendong finally achieved eighth place.

On 22 March, in the men's singles final of the Asian Cup Table Tennis Tournament, he lost to Ma Long 3:4 and won the runner-up.

On 28 July 2015, in the 13th round of the Table Tennis Super League men's competition, 18-year-old Fan Zhendong of the Bayi Team won another victory this round.

So far, his personal winning rate is still 100%.

In 2016, he won the ITTF Star Point Award, and he was nominated for the Best Male Star Award every year between 2013 and 2016.

A right-handed shakehand-grip player, Fan plays an attacking style of table tennis using his explosive footwork and thunderous and well placed loops to finish off his opponents.

Emerging as a 16-year-old wunderkind, Fan's playing style is often compared to his senior compatriot Ma Long.

In addition to being trained by national team coaches, he has been specially trained by both Wang Hao and Ma Lin.

His encounters against senior players in the Chinese national team have drawn much speculation and anticipation.

His fearlessness and technique allow him to challenge highly rated, experienced players, sometimes even beating top players in thrilling style.

Fan raises his elbow higher on his strokes compared to some of his contemporaries such as Ma Long and Xu Xin, resulting in a stronger backhand-forehand transition game at the expense of a more vulnerable middle.

In 2021, Timo Boll stated that he felt that he and Fan played a similar style except that Fan was better.

Boll did not elaborate further.

Fan was a Stiga sponsored athlete.

However, he changed to Butterfly Fan Zhendong ALC, he uses a black DHS Hurricane 3 neo National Blue Sponge for forehand and a Red Tenergy 05 for backhand.

In April 2018, he achieved the top spot in the world rankings after holding position No. 2 for 29 consecutive months, starting from November 2015.

Fan's attacking style of play involves explosive footwork and powerful forehand loops.

His thick-set build has led fans and commentators to affectionately refer to him as "Little Fatty".

His continuous rise to becoming one of the top table tennis players in the world has garnered him a large fanbase worldwide, with over half a million followers on Chinese social media site Weibo.

In the early morning of 22 January 2018, the Hungarian Open, the first ITTF tournament in 2018, decided on four championships, all of which were won by China Table Tennis Federation.

Fan Zhendong defeated another Chinese player Wang Chuqin 4-1 in the men's singles final and won the championship;

During the 2019 world table tennis championships, he changed to the new Butterfly Dignics 05 on his backhand that had just been released on 1 April 2019.

Butterfly announced its signing of Fan Zhendong on 1 November 2021.

On 3 March 2019, Fan Zhendong won all 11 matches in the 2019 Direct Tournament and received the qualification for singles participation in the 2019 World Table Tennis Championships in Budapest and a high cash reward of 1 million.

On 15 November 2020, he defeated Ma Long 4-3 in the men's singles final of the 2020 Men's Table Tennis World Cup and won the championship for the fourth time.