The doubles team of Li Ju and Wang Nan has dominated women's table tennis of late, but Wang gets most of the attention as the top-ranked singles player in the world.
Occasionally, though, Li manages to slip out of the shadows. After all, she is ranked No. 2.
Together, the duo owns the 1999 World Championships gold medal and has won the Pro Tour Finals for three straight years, 1997 through 1999. They almost had the other world championship from that stretch, too, but lost out in the 1997 finals to four-time Olympic gold medallist Deng Yaping and her partner, Yang Ying.
In singles, the 1997 Pro Tour final came down to Li and Wang, and Li won the title. In 1998, she won the prestigious China Open. Then she again reached the final of the 1999 Pro Tour, but lost to Chen Jing of Chinese Taipei (Taiwan), the 1988 Olympic gold medallist originally withChina.
In 2000, Li was defeated again by Wang at the Japan Open, but turned the tables at the China Grand Prix. On the Pro Tour standings by mid July, Li was where she is often found second, behind Wang.
Li first emerged as a rising star of the game withChina's national youth team at 15. She had begun playing in 1985, seven years after she was born inNantong,East China'sJiangsuProvince.
An aggressive, shakehand-style player, she made her Olympic debut at the Sydney 2000 Games, and won the women's singles silver.
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