For the first time since 1988 there will be no New Zealand table tennis presence at the Olympic Games, after Karen Li was today denied a spot in this year's team.

The New Zealand Olympic Committee (NZOC) declined Li's application for the Beijing Games in August despite her winning the Oceania tournament in New Caledonia last month, which doubled as an Olympic qualifying event.

The committee ruled that Li's world ranking of 153 meant she was unlikely to reach the top 16 at Beijing, the NZOC criteria for most individual sport selections.

New Zealand has had table tennis representatives at every Olympics since Seoul 20 years ago, when Peter Jackson and Barry Griffiths competed in the men's doubles.

Li Chunli, Karen Li's older sister, then dominated the women's game in New Zealand, attending Olympics consecutively from 1992 to 2004 before retiring after the Athens Games.

The sisters competed in doubles in the 2000 and 2004 games.

Table Tennis New Zealand high performance director Shane Warbrooke said Li's non-selection was very disappointing as he believed the 30-year-old had the capacity to reach the top 16 in Beijing.

"We believe that given her results at the Olympic qualifying tournament and the feedback from Chunli, who's the Table Tennis New Zealand head coach, Karen is performing at as high a level, or a higher level than she has in the past," Warbrooke said.

"Given the fact that she has demonstrated her ability to perform well at Commonwealth Games in the past we believe she has got the ability to finish in the top 16."

Warbrooke said Li's world ranking was not a true reflection of her ability, and that funding issues in New Zealand for sports like table tennis meant players were disadvantaged.

"With table tennis being a minor sport there's not a lot of funding for someone like Karen Li to attend a lot of international events, so she hasn't had the ability to play in enough events where she can have results against world-ranked players to boost her ranking."

Warbrooke said he would like to see a change to NZOC selection rules for table tennis, suggesting it adopt the ITTF (International Table Tennis Federation) criteria.

"If our players qualify through Oceania and if the international federation say that the players have qualified for the Olympics, then we would hope that the NZOC would select the players on that basis."

Warbrooke said he believed Li's exclusion could have a detrimental effect on the future of table tennis in New Zealand.

"(She) is one of the best women's table tennis players that we've had in New Zealand and the way that she dominated the Oceania Olympic qualifying tournament, it almost makes the Olympics unattainable for our players," he said.

"When they're coming through are they going to see the Olympics as a reachable goal or is it just completely out of their reach?"

Posted May 2008