Dae-seong Cho and Eun-hye Lee Table Tennis Championships both men’s and women’s singles

Cho Dae-seong and Jang Woo-jin’s 3rd consecutive losing streak ‥ Naturalized Lee Eun-hye Second domestic leader

Cho Dae-seong (20, Samsung Life Insurance) and Lee Eun-hye (27, Korean Air) climbed to the top of individual singles at the 75th National Men’s and Women’s Comprehensive Table Tennis Championships.

▲ 2nd year unemployment Cho Dae-seong (20? Samsung Life Insurance) defeated defending champion Jang Woo-jin (Army Sports Corps) 3-0 (11-5 12 -10 11-7) to win the championship and lift the champion flag.[대한탁구협회 제공]

In the men’s singles final held at the Jecheon Gymnasium in North Chungcheong Province on the 23rd, Cho Dae-sung defeated the ‘defending champion’ Jang Woo-jin (Army Sports Unit) 3-0 (11-5 12-10 11-7), who was aiming for a third straight victory. Cho Dae-seong, who signed an early contract with Samsung Life Insurance in July 2020 when he was in high school and settled down on the unemployment stage since last year, won the first individual championship in his career at the comprehensive championship, which is considered the most prestigious competition in Korea.

In 2017, when he was in middle school, he set the record of being the youngest ever to advance to the semifinals, and the following year he again recorded the record of being the youngest to advance to the finals. However, in both cases, Jang Woo-jin was blocked and had to stop winning the championship.

Cho Dae-seong, who took first place in the 2022 national team selection held earlier this month, opened the door vigorously to winning the Hangzhou Asian Games this year with successive wins. Jo Dae-seong said, “If possible, I want to leave the best record in the most prestigious competition. “I want to break the men’s record of winning seven championships,” he said.

▲ Lee Eun-hye (27? Korean Air) is holding the champion flag after taking the top spot in the individual singles of the 75th National Men’s and Women’s Comprehensive Table Tennis Championships. [대한탁구협회 제공]

In the women’s singles final, Korean Air ‘ace’ Eun-hye Lee defeated Ha-eun Yang (Posco Energy) 3-1 (11-4 11-9 9-11 16-14) and climbed to the top. Lee Eun-hye, who was born in Inner Mongolia, China, became a naturalized Korean in 2011 and played as a regular at Danwon High School, the strongest female high school student, before joining Korean Air in 2014.

Although he contributed greatly to Korean Air maintaining its prestigious position in the women’s division, he never showed much prominence in the individual event.

This is the second time he has won an individual event in a major domestic competition after winning the Unemployment Championship in 2016. In this year’s national competition, even though they achieved good results, they were unable to wear the Taegeuk mark due to the rule that only two naturalized players were selected.

Byung-gyu Choi, staff reporter