ArticleBMC sports science, medicine & rehabilitation2026
Stroke-level performance fluctuation analysis in elite table tennis.
Article in BMC sports science, medicine & rehabilitation, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
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Abstract
backgroundTable tennis is characterized by high intensity and short rallies, where the stability of technical and tactical execution is crucial to performance. Existing research on performance fluctuations has primarily focused on psychological or score-based metrics, neglecting the technical execution of strokes. To address this gap, this study introduces a novel metric: Stroke Performance Fluctuation (SPF).
methodThe dataset consists of 100 elite matches (50 male and 50 female matches) between 2021 and 2025, analyzing 2,163 rallies and 29,406 strokes. SPF is quantified as the deviation between Rally Winning Probability (RWP) and Expected Rally Winning Probability (ERWP). SPF values were also compared across gender, competitive level and games.
results(1) Male players exhibited significantly higher fluctuations than female players, particularly in Block, Flick, Push, Touch Short, Topspin, and Twist; (2) Top 20 players are more consistent than others in serving, receiving, and offensive techniques; (3) Performance in Touch Short against Pendulum and Topspin against Topspin exhibited a significant decline in the later stages of the match.
conclusionsThe SPF indicator provides a novel and effective measure of stroke behavior stability in elite table tennis. By quantifying fluctuations in technical and tactical performance, the SPF indicator reveals gender- and competition-level differences in stroke stability. In addition, we used performance deviation to describe how consistency changes across games within a match. This framework not only advances performance analysis beyond score-based or psychology-based measures but also offers practical applications for coaches, enabling targeted training and tactical interventions to reduce stroke instability and enhance competitive resilience.
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