CHENGDU, China, Nov. 30 -- Former winner Dimitrij Ovtcharov rallied past Swedish Mattias Falck, runner-up of the 2019 Budapest World Championships, to reach the quarterfinals at the ITTF men's World Cup here on Saturday.
Ovtcharov, the 2017 Cup title holder in Liege, Belgium, was trailing 2-1, 3-2 on sets before turning over the table to beat Falck 11-8, 3-11, 8-11, 11-8, 10-12, 11-7, 13-11.
The 31-year-old German, who lifted the China Open trophy in the same stadium two years ago after all the Chinese committed a halfway boycott, will next play the second-seeded "Grand Slam" winner Ma Long in the quarters later on Saturday.
Ma, who just returns to the competitive court after a surgery, withstood his first-round test with a 4-2 victory over Frenchman Simon Gauzy, while his countryman and top seed Fan Zhendong eased past Daniel Habesohn of Austria in four straight sets to face German veteran Timo Boll.
The other two quarterfinal encounters will pit Japanese duo Harimoto Tomokazu and Niwa Koki, as well as Lin Yun-Ju of Chinese Taipei and Brazilian Hugo Calderano, the winner over American teenage sensation Kanak Jha.