There is no rest for the world's best table tennis players, as they travel from Kuwait City to Doha for the second Super Series event of the year, the GAC Group 2015 World Tour Qatar Open.
Qualifications for the US$220,000 Qatar Open begins today 17 February with the main draw starting on Friday 20 February where the top seeds face the lucky few that made it through qualification stage.
Olympic bronze medalist Dimitrij OVTCHAROV (GER) is the headline act, as he takes part in his first World Tour event of 2015 in Qatar, after missing the Kuwait Open with an arm injury.
Upon arriving in Doha, the 26 year old was in a buoyant mood after his recent win at the ITTF-Europe Top 16 Cup a few weeks ago: "I have practiced well over the past two months and have got a lot of confidence from my past few tournaments, especially the ITTF-Europe Top 16 Cup. My big goal here is to win my first Super Series title of the year, and I think I am well prepared to do so."
"This is a very high level event with top players. If I play great, then I will have a good chance to win the title, but I need to focus on ball by ball starting in the first round."
OVTCHAROV will need to be at his best to beat rivals such as Marcos FREITAS (POR), CHUANG Chih-Yuan (TPE) and Vladimir SAMSONOV (BLR) to reach his ultimate goal.
FENG Tianwei (SIN), who won three World Tour events in 2014, will be the hot favourite on the women's side with no Chinese players taking part in the event.
The stylish defender SEO Hyowon (KOR) and Georgina POTA (HUN), who had a breakthrough year in 2014 reaching the Women's World Cup and World Tour Grand Finals semi finals, will be FENG's big threat to the title in Qatar.
The 2015 World Tour is offering a record US$3,000,000 in prize money and will also be the most viewed in history, with more events shown live throughout the world on television and all the events being shown live on ITTF's live streaming platform, itTV.
As was the case in 2014, the GAC Group 2015 ITTF World Tour will be split up into three tiers (highest first): Super (6 events), Major (6 events), Challenge (11 events).
The top 16 singles and top 8 doubles pairs on the World Tour Standings will then be invited to the prestigious World Tour Grand Finals at the end of the year, the location to be announced later.
For more information and photos, please contact: media@ittfmail.com
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