Is he or she the main player in table tennis mixed doubles?

Since mixed doubles have been set up in the table tennis competition of the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games, coaches and players have paid increasing attention to mixed doubles matches. This study aims to compare and analyse male and female performance in the different contexts of table tennis mixed doubles as well as the impact of their performance on the probability of winning matches.

100 matches between the top 30 mixed doubles were selected (based on the world rankings for 2019 to 2021) as samples. According to the stroke order of a mixed doubles match, the players are divided into four groups: male versus male (P_m-m), male versus female (P_m-f), female versus male (P_f-m) and female versus female (P_f-f). Then, new methods with concepts are proposed to analyse stroke performance by four groups of players in various competition contexts of mixed doubles.

(1) The stroke performance in the first four strokes was much better than that in the after four strokes (P < 0.05), and males performed better than female players in the first four strokes (P < 0.05). (2) The stroke performance of each group for winning matches was significantly better than that for losing matches (P < 0.01). (3) Players in each group performed better (P < 0.01) in the ahead and under control states than in the behind and lost control states. However, most stroke performance within the four groups was not significantly different in different states. (4) The impact of scoring rates by different groups on the winning probability of a mixed doubles match from high to low was P_m-f > P_f-f > P_m-m > P_f-m. (5) In the actual competition, the percentage of female players serving first in each game is 79.64%, and the percentage of the stroke group of female players serving to female players receiving (P_f-f) is 58.25%.

This study considers several competition contexts to analyse the performance of male and female players in table tennis mixed doubles. We propose that the stroke performance of male versus female players is the most important factor affecting the results of mixed doubles matches. In addition, selecting the first server or first receiver in each game reasonably and analysing the stroke orders emphatically are also very important in mixed doubles.