European Championships: Li Jiao-Irene Ivancan

[@tabl10s]

I loved Ivancan's power.

[@thresholden]

Iva's backhand rubber is inverted, right? She really ought to use her backhand loop more. Jiao messed up a lot when a particular spinny ball reached her wide backhand. Otherwise her backhand blocks and redirects were awesome. I grew up with one-sided penholder and Jiao's great blocking really makes me sad that single sided is out of favor. Also, how does she block so well with inverted rubber? I can only use single sided penhold with short pips.

[@VititSongcharoen]

@happyvitit Yeah! I konw ...with spiny ball goes to her (Irene) forehand, She has two choice, one: is chop at under the ball with minimal push (liked joo se hyuk), two: counter attacked with high speed looped. In this video, she choose to chop return but with false angle, so it bounce very high... That's sweet for Jiao

[@eetsmakelijk5426]

@BustyGretchen First of all they came to play for a Dutch team and to play competition. Many foreign players do that in many countries. She didn't come to become Euro Champ. But now she and the players u mentioned lived, trained and played in the Netherlands for over 10 years. Is it weird that they represent the Netherlands? It is a fact that the gap between European women and Asian women is insanely big. But Jiao is top-20 of the world, so it is not weird that she is leading the Dutch team.

[@eetsmakelijk5426]

@BustyGretchen They don't get to play less because of this, apart from the team events. They can still play as many singles as they want. And when they get to play team events, they get good opponents so they can learn from it.

[@idnumber002]

wheres...toth, li qian and all the other euros??

[@Opalance]

@Kinamoe123 Well it's not a big surprise...you could take any of the 20+ Chinese females in their super league and they could become champion in any continent outside of Asia. Example, when Irene played in the Chinese open and faced who is maybe the 10th best female Chinese player and lost 11-3, 11-5, 11-4, 11-7

[@LightSpeed99999]

@karlospkc89 I thought getting a Grand Slam in table tennis meant winning gold in a World Cup, WTTC, and Olympic Game over the course of one's career..........

[@Crytt]

@Gzusvictory True.

[@BustyGretchen]

@EetSmakelijk Not many other European teams (if any) consist of 100% foreigners like The Netherlands and it's a fact other Dutch players (almost) don't get a chance to play on an international level because of this.

[@VititSongcharoen]

Why Ivancan cannot chop with her forehand? and why all both side not even use looping??

[@rosun82]

@happyvitit Do you even know what is looping?

[@ololofast]

YAAAAAAAAA

[@0o0jf0o0]

@tyoungos this is not tennis, it's not called grand slam!

[@absolutenerd1989]

does it matter what language they speak?

[@UsakoKirei]

@BustyGretchen there are surely many reason, why other women do net have a chance to play. but i do not think its because of the chinese and russian.

[@phatz755]

I really wanted Ivancan to win...

[@karlospkc89]

@0o0jf0o0 We Chinese will still call it grand slam

[@BustyGretchen]

@rosun82 Not with 2 Chinese and 2 Russians (the Timina sisters) blocking her way. I'm going to leave now, this topic is starting to bore me. See ya! not!

[@eberaldo]

Problem is, if you (as a female player) can't beat such an antique playstyle as onesided penhold, then you didn't deserve to win the ETTC. simple as that. same goes for all the WTTC. apart from that, judging by playing style and my estimate of skill, i did not expect to see irene ivancan in the finals. this is my first look into the ETTC female division, i didn't follow results or such.

[@rmachayes]

Yes, her smile could stop a charging elephant. (well, maybe a little one ha). One thing that amazes me about Li is the fact that her footwork is, for lack of better ways to describe it, lazy. I mean that her basic stance is both feet spread at a 45 degree angle and seldom varies no matter what the return. On the other hand, look at Irene bouncing around like a butterfly in the wind. This seems to be the case for the better professionals. BUT, Li has been sucessfull, gotta give her that!!

[@BustyGretchen]

Yes, another Chinese winning the European title! BTW the Dutch have 2 Chinese players and one Russian player in their women's team. O_o One Dutch player even stopped playing because she never got a chance to play in the national team. Nice, huh?

[@rosun82]

@BustyGretchen Good decision for the dutch player....since she is definitely going nowhere...

[@orangeempathy]

Holy shit. A chinese old timer becomes the Eu champ? LOL.

[@d4l00f]

this sucks.....