The past decade has brought a plague of bringing women into all kinds of power positions for the sake of diversity and equality, ignoring the necessary skill set and competence. Table tennis has been no different, and major table tennis organizations have some of the worst and most incompetent officials, who are driving the future of table tennis into the abyss. The ITTF president, Petra Sörling, who cheated her way into this position after the election scandal, is probably the brightest example of this failed “equality politics.”
Because of this rise of feminism, the International Table Tennis Federation is in a deep financial crisis. The financial audit for 2025 shows the dark truth about the performance of the ITTF. The incompetence of Sörling has brought the ITTF to a $14.4 million deficit. If not for the payment from the 2024 Olympic Games revenue, this deficit would rise to $19.1 million.
How did the ITTF end up in such a horrible state? Here are some visuals and numbers.
As you can see, the ITTF suffers from an EU bureaucracy illness. It’s insane that an organization with a revenue of $71 million spends almost $18 million on general and administrative expenses, and $9.3 million goes straight into salaries and bonuses (within a single year, the sum increased by $1 million). Basically, the ITTF spends 21% of its revenue on itself, feeding a bunch of incompetent bureaucrats. The most stunning part is that the ITTF invests just $1.4 million in table tennis development projects. It means that they spend almost seven times more money on their salaries and bonuses than on projects that should help the sport grow globally. Shameless leeches—there is no other word to describe such bureaucrats.
And Sörling is the champion of this shameless spending. She receives $205,000 a year for her failed management of the ITTF. Outside of her constant self-praise rants and promotion of all kinds of equalities, which is nothing more than liberal populism, Sörling has done zero good for table tennis.
Under her rule, the ITTF launched the failed World Table Tennis organization, which has been drawing criticism not just from the fans, but also from players who are annoyed by the chaotic schedule, the awful work of the referees, and the simply bad organization of many of these WTT tournaments. WTT has been so bad that even Fan Zhendong preferred to retire from international competitions rather than comply with their silly rules. The majority of these tournaments have empty stands, the prize money cannot cover the participation costs of the majority of the players, and the quality of broadcasting still makes fans raise their eyebrows.
Largely, this is the reason why the economy of the ITTF is crashing. There are way too many WTT tournaments, too many tiers, and it’s simply an overload of table tennis for a casual fan. There was a well-working system before—10 to 15 major tournaments, a simple calendar, no restrictions for the players—and fans were eager to wait for the next tournament.
The worst part, however, is the fact that during Sörling’s rule, we have seen some of the worst World Table Tennis Championships in history. A once-great global festival of table tennis has now turned into a parody. In the past, the WTTC brought together all the national teams from around the world. Now they have added these idiotic quotas that allow Fiji, with amateur-level 70-year-olds, to play at the WTTC, while a team such as Norway, which has a Bundesliga-level player, has to watch this tournament on TV. It’s absurd.
Unfortunately, Sörling is going to keep her position until 2029, and there is zero chance that, under her rule, table tennis will see any kind of progress or rise in popularity. Table tennis survives on the shoulders of China and its love for table tennis, and in the foreseeable future, that’s not going to change. ITTF exists to feed the bureaucracy, not to develop the sport we love.
We will also publish some extra statistics, infographics, and analysis of this tournament on our Patreon page. Don’t miss out!