The International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF) and Asian Table Tennis Union event has seen 11 straight Chinese winners of the men’s event, while the country boosts 10 of the last 11 women’s champions.

Their run was assured of continuing after an impressive second day of competition at the Yokohama Cultural Gymnasium.

Defending women’s champion Zhu Yuling faced a tough run to the final following yesterday’s group stage.

She faced Miu Hirano in the quarter-finals after the Japanese player bounced back from a disappointing group phase by winning a playoff.

Hirano, the reigning Asian champion and last year’s World Championship silver medallist, claimed the opening game against Zhu.

The defending champion immediately hit back and eventually won 9-11, 11-7, 11-2, 10-21, 11-7, 11-8.

Zhu then faced a semi-final clash with Singapore’s Feng Tianwei, the last non-Chinese player to win the event having triumphed in 2015.

Having fallen behind early, Zhu stormed back again to win 9-11, 11-9, 11-5, 11-5, 14-12.

She is now set to face her compatriot Chen Meng in the final.

Chen enjoyed a walkover at the quarter-final stage of the event, before beating Japan’s Kasumi Ishikawa 11-1, 11-9, 11-4, 7-11, 11-8 in the last four.

Ishikawa and Feng are due to contest the bronze medal match tomorrow.

Defending men’s singles champion Fan Zhendong was largely untroubled in his two matches today.

He beat Chinese Taipei’s Lin Yun-ju 11-9, 11-7, 11-8, 8-11, 11-8 in the quarter-finals before overcoming Japan’s Tomokazu Harimoto 6-11, 11-6, 11-8, 11-9, 11-4.

Fan is now scheduled to face his compatriot Ma Long in tomorrow’s gold medal match.

Ma secured an 11-5, 11-5, 6-11, 11-6, 11-3 win over India’s Sathiyan Gnanasekaran in the quarter-finals.

He then cruised past Japan’s Koki Niwa 11-5, 11-6, 11-8, 11-6 in the semi-final.

Niwa and Harimoto are set to contest an all-Japanese bronze medal match.

The winner will join the finalists in qualifying for this year’s ITTF World Cups.