INEXPERIENCE, RETIREMENTS BEHIND DECLINE

STTA’s Poh explains women’s team failure to qualify for Paris; individual spots available

- David Lee

In experience has cost the women's team a place at the Paris Olympics, said Singapore Table Tennis Association (STTA) president Poh Li San, ending a run that spanned four Games beginning at the 2008 edition in Beijing.

The latest world team rankings were released on March 4, and the Republic slipped from 10th to 18th.

This means they missed out on the last four qualifying spots based on world rankings. These instead went to Thailand (No. 11), Poland (12), India (13) and Sweden (15).

The drop in rankings came after the trio of Zeng Jian, Zhou Jingyi and Wong Xin Ru were defeated 3-0 by Poland in the round of 32 at February's World Team Table Tennis Championships in Busan, South Korea.

Had they beaten the Poles and progressed to the last 16, they would have secured enough ranking points to qualify for the Olympics.

Poh attributed the team's decline to the retirement of China-born players Feng Tianwei, Yu Mengyu and Lin Ye, who were all ranked in the top 35 at some point, as well as inexperience.

Feng has three Olympic medals, while she and Yu were in the side that beat China to become world champions in 2010.