WORST PRESIDENT AMONG RACKET SPORTS
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. Table tennis has been no different, and major table tennis organizations have some of the worst and most unprofessional 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 disgraceful ITTF election scandal, is probably the brightest example of this failed “equality and diversity politics” in sports.
Because of this global rise of feminism, the International Table Tennis Federation is now 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. Table tennis has by far the worst president from all the major racket sports.
You think it’s exaggerated? Just look at the numbers, comparing the finances of the major organizations of table tennis, tennis, badminton, and padel.
THE COST OF
POOR LEADERSHIP
How much do four major racket-sport organizations spend on administration? The ITTF stands out for its administrative spending as a share of total expenses.
Bars are scaled to ITTF’s reported 20.9% share. Categories may not be identical across organizations.
| Organization | Administration | Total expenses | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| ITTF | $17.9M | $85.0M | 20.9% |
| ATP Tour | $20.0M | $241.6M | 8.2% |
| BWF | $4.2M | $35.0M | 12.0% |
| FIP | $2.1M | $17.4M | 12.1% |
A single connected comparison line: green indicates reported profit, fading to grey as the line crosses below zero into ITTF’s reported loss.
Data: 2024 (ATP Tour) and 2025 figures provided by the publicly available audits. Percentages are displayed as supplied (rounded).
As you can see, the ITTF suffers from the typical European Union bureaucracy-style 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, travels and bonuses than on projects that should help the sport grow globally. Shameless leeches—there is no other word to describe such useless 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 diversities & equalities, which is nothing more than Swedish-style leftist populism, Sörling has done zero good for table tennis. Thanks to her, table tennis is in the worst position among the racket sports. At such pace, a much younger padel gonna outgrow table tennis and create much better environment for its athletes in a foreseeable future.
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 a 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 Pro Tour 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 lifeless parody, covered in dark so the TV & online audience wouldn’t see the empty stands. In the past, the World Championships brought together all the national teams from all around the world. Now they have added these silly quotas that allow Fiji, with amateur-level 70-year-old players to play at the WTTC, while a team such as Norway, which has a Bundesliga-level player, has to watch this tournament on TV. That’s insane.
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. Take the Chinese fans away from the major tournaments, and the atmosphere would feel dead. Under Sörling, ITTF exists for the purpose of feeding the roten bureaucracy, instead of developing the sport we love.
