Nguyen Khoa Dieu Khanh and her journey to winning the Southeast Asian women's singles table tennis championship

It must be emphasized that the gold medal in the women's singles at the 2024 Southeast Asian Table Tennis Championship (taking place in Thailand from November 19 to November 24) that Dieu Khanh brought home for the Vietnamese table tennis team was a big surprise.

This event is considered the most difficult of the 7 events that coach Doan Kien Quoc and his team participated in, including men's team, women's team, men's doubles, women's doubles, mixed doubles, men's singles and women's singles.

Dieu Khanh won the gold medal in the women's singles event at the 2024 Southeast Asian Table Tennis Championship (Photo: NVCC).

As soon as he returned home, tennis player Nguyen Khoa Dieu Khanh had a chat with Dan Tri to tell about his journey to winning the title in Thailand.

First of all, congratulations to Dieu Khanh for winning the prestigious gold medal at the 2024 Southeast Asian Table Tennis Championship. How do you feel right now?

– Until now, I still feel as if I am flying on clouds. That is the result that makes me feel happy and joyful, because after months of tireless efforts, I have realized my dream of winning the women's singles championship in the Southeast Asian tournament.

In July, I reached the Olympic qualifying finals, but when I was just one match away from the 2024 Paris Olympics, I lost. At that time, I was sad and felt very regretful. Therefore, this gold medal is a great encouragement, to show that I have had a relatively successful 2024.

Looking back at the journey to win the only gold medal for the Vietnamese table tennis team in the recent Southeast Asian tournament, many people who witnessed your matches felt breathless with excitement. Can you share your memorable experiences in the journey to conquer the throne?

– My teammates and I in the Vietnam table tennis team mostly compete domestically, so when we get to play in the international arena, we all have the same feeling of anxiety and desire to win. Everyone has the spirit of national pride, so we are all very determined.

However, on the first day of the tournament, in the women's team event, our team was eliminated from the group stage. What made the whole team feel remorseful and regretful was being eliminated in the life-and-death match with the Malaysian team, and losing from a winning position.

In the final set (set 5) of the final match (game 5) with the Malaysian team, Ms. Mai Hoang My Trang led her opponent 10-7 and had a 3 match point advantage over her opponent (in each table tennis set, the player who scores 11 points first will win, in case two players have a score of 10-10, the player who wins two consecutive points after that will win).

Surprisingly, Trang still let her opponent tie the score 10-10 and then won the decisive match. Obviously, my team just lacked a bit of luck to win and qualify for the semi-finals, which meant holding a medal for sure.

Having lost shockingly in the group stage of the team event, the fact that I was able to defeat all my opponents to win the gold medal in the women's singles event was also a great surprise, and even I didn't think I could do such an unbelievable thing.

During your journey to win the gold medal in the women's singles, everyone who watched agreed that every match of yours was very dramatic and difficult, the feeling of suspense was heart-stopping. So for you personally, who did you find the most difficult opponent and how did you defeat your opponent?

– For me, the match against Thai player Jinnipa Sawettabut in the women's singles quarter-finals was the most difficult, because if I won this match, I would definitely get a medal.

In terms of world rankings, Thai athletes are much better than me. Jinnipa Sawettabut is currently ranked 146th in the world, at one point he was ranked 98th in the world, while my position in the world rankings is 587th, 441 places lower than him.

Dieu Khanh in the women's singles final and easily defeated Malaysian tennis player Tel Ai Xin with a score of 4-0, convincingly winning the gold medal (Photo: NVCC).

In this match, I just tried my best, taking advantage of every opportunity to score points. It was a match that I did not expect to win. But it seemed that I was not under any psychological pressure, so I played quite confidently to win against the player who was considered the number one candidate for the gold medal in the women's singles.

In the semi-final, I met Alice Chang from Malaysia. She is a very tenacious defensive player, sabotaging her opponent with her extremely annoying blocks. Luckily, I had met her before in the Olympic qualifiers in July and I had won 4-1.

So when I entered this match, I already knew his playing style. In addition, my coaching staff and I also spent time researching and reviewing his matches with other opponents to find the most effective strategy.

Therefore, when entering the match, I always think that I have to persevere to win each point, absolutely cannot be impatient because he is strong in defense, so if I am impatient, it will be easy to make mistakes leading to missed shots.

During the match, I exploited the middle and left of his table, then waited for the opportunity when he made a mistake to finish the ball to win the point for me. I have to admit that it was also a very difficult match for me when I won the championship.

With this gold medal, it can be seen that Vietnamese athletes are not inferior to those of other Southeast Asian countries, although we are at a disadvantage in terms of investment, especially in terms of less opportunities to compete in international tournaments. Do you agree with the above viewpoint and what is your dream after this tournament?

– I agree with this point of view. In fact, my teammates and I in the Vietnam table tennis team have very few opportunities to interact and compete in international tournaments. In domestic tournaments, the top players are already familiar with each other and are very familiar with each other’s balls.

So we always dream of competing in international tournaments, to encounter new situations and levels so we can learn more.

Dieu Khanh has participated in the SEA Games 4 times, winning a bronze medal in the women's team event at the 31st SEA Games (Photo: Tuan Bao).

I always hope that my teammates and I in the Vietnamese table tennis team will receive more investment in 2025, participate in many international tournaments to accumulate experience, thereby having the best preparation for the goal of winning gold medals at the SEA Games in 2025.

It is known that after winning the gold medal at the Southeast Asian tournament, you received many valuable rewards, including a trip to compete in the WTT (world professional table tennis tournament) taking place in Oman in January 2025?

– I feel very happy to receive the WTT competition award. For table tennis players, competing in WTT is an honor that not everyone can have. Partly because the cost of competing in WTT is very expensive, because for athletes participating in WTT in Southeast Asia, the cost of food, accommodation and travel is about 2,000 USD (equivalent to 50 million VND).

The cost of participation in other countries in Asia or Europe is much larger, possibly hundreds of millions of dong or more.

It is worth mentioning that the WTT competition is a knockout competition, so sometimes if an athlete loses a match, they will have to go home. If they lose hundreds of millions of dong just to play one match and then go home, no athlete would dare to spend their own money to participate without sponsors.

On the contrary, when sponsors invest in athletes, they must also believe that their athletes have enough class to compete with the world's top athletes.

And importantly, participating in WTT means competing with the world's top athletes, through which I learn a lot of techniques, psychology, and competition tactics. Therefore, when I received this award, I felt extremely happy and I will try to prepare myself well in terms of technique and tactics for this big arena.

To have Nguyen Khoa Dieu Khanh like today, you must have pursued and practiced table tennis from a very early age. Can you share what fate brought you to table tennis?

– Since I was little, when I was only 7 or 8 years old, my father took me to the courts to get acquainted with table tennis. At that time, my father saw that his daughter also liked playing table tennis, so he hired a teacher. At first, my father just wanted to train my health because I was very skinny and small at that time.

Then my teacher praised me for my talent and advised my father to invest in his daughter to become a professional athlete. However, it was not until I was 18 that I officially pursued a professional career, quite late compared to other professional athletes. I am also confident that I came to table tennis late but my achievements are quite good at this time.

Your medal collection must be quite impressive and which medal do you feel most honored and proud of?

– It’s not as “huge” as many people think. It was not until 2022 that I won my first gold medal at the national championship. But that year I won all 4 gold medals for women, including women’s team, mixed doubles, women’s doubles and women’s singles. Those gold medals gave me great motivation to conquer the next goals.

In 2023, I only won the Silver Medal (HCB) in the National Championship as well as the National Strong Teams Tournament. But in the 2023 Best Tennis Players Tournament, I won the Gold Medal. In 2024, I competed relatively successfully, winning the Gold Medal in the National Championship and the National Strong Teams Tournament. The 2024 Best Tennis Players Tournament has not yet taken place.

In table tennis, do you have any idol players?

– As a female player, I idolize the male player Fan Zhendong of China. Not only because he has been the world number one for a long time, but also because Fan Zhendong has top-notch skills and tactics that all table tennis players in the world admire.

He is a player with a very comprehensive two-stroke style (attacking both left and right), with extremely high speed that many people love and call him a “ball machine”, especially I really like his extremely perfect backhand. Of course I idolize him because he is also very attractive and handsome.

A fierce competitor on the table tennis court, but in real life Dieu Khanh is a gentle and feminine girl (Photo: NVCC).

One last question, what are your goals for 2025 and beyond?

– I aim to continue to successfully defend the gold medal at the national championship and the national strong team tournament in 2025. Next, I have to achieve the best results, specifically the gold medal at the 2025 SEA Games.

And if possible, I dream of participating in many international tournaments. Competing with the world's top athletes is the dream of every Vietnamese table tennis athlete.

Thank you for this conversation!

Nguyen Khoa Dieu Khanh was born in 1998, from Ninh Thuan . The 26-year-old tennis player is currently an athlete on the Ho Chi Minh City table tennis team.

Dieu Khanh is also a member of the Vietnamese table tennis team at the 29th SEA Games (2017), 30th SEA Games (2019), 31st SEA Games (2021) and 32nd SEA Games (2023).

At the 31st SEA Games at home, Dieu Khanh won the bronze medal for the first time in the women's team event.

2024 is considered a successful year for Dieu Khanh when she won the gold medal at the national championship and the national strong team tournament; reached the final round of the 2024 Paris Olympic qualifying round in Southeast Asia; won the gold medal at the 2024 Southeast Asian championship.

Dantri.com.vn

Source: https://dantri.com.vn/the-thao/nguyen-khoa-dieu-khanh-va-hanh-trinh-vo-dich-don-nu-bong-ban-dong-nam-a-20241128011023161.htm