Charlotte Carey will be the first Great Britain player in action as the World Singles Qualification Tournament gets under way on Sunday morning.

She faces Zauresh Akasheva (WR 171) of Kazakhstan at 9.15am UK time on table 2, while Tin-Tin Ho plays Ruta Paskauskiene (WR 246) of Lithuania at 10am on table 4.

Matches on tables 1-4 will be streamed live on the ITTF Facebook page – click here to watch.

Liam Pitchford and Paul Drinkhall both have byes through the first round of the men’s singles and will be in action later on Sunday. Liam is due to be on at 1pm against Benedek Olah of Finland on table 1 and Paul plays at 1.45pm on table 3 against Pang Yew En Koen of Singapore.

What is the format?

There are four men’s singles and five women’s singles places in Tokyo up for grabs at the tournament in Doha, Qatar.

The events are made up of two stages of knockouts. In the men’s draw, there are three initial knockout brackets and the winner of each claims an Olympic spot.

The second phase involves one knockout bracket including the beaten finalists and semi-finalists from the first stage, and the winner of that phase will take the fourth and final Olympic place.

Pitchford, the competition’s top seed, received a bye into the last 16 of the KO1 bracket and faces Benedek Olah of Finland (WR 86), who defeated Congo’s Christ Bienatiki (WR 578) in four straight.

Drinkhall also had a bye in KO2 and plays Pang Yew En Koen (WR 159) of Singapore, who defeated Ioannis Sgouropoulos of Greece (WR 147) in six.

In the women’s event, there are four initial knockout brackets, with Carey in KO1 and Ho in KO2. The winner of each section qualifies for the Olympics.

The four beaten finalists in the women’s first phase will play a second knockout stage and the winner will also go to Tokyo.

Schedule

Women’s Singles
KO 1
Round of 16
Charlotte Carey v Zauresh Akasheva (KAZ)

KO2
Round of 16
Tin-Tin Ho v Ruta Paskauskiene (LTU)

Men’s Singles
KO 1
Round of 16
Liam Pitchford v Benedek Olah (FIN) or Christ Bienatiki (CGO)

KO2
Round of 16
Paul Drinkhall v Ioannis Sgouropoulos (GRE) or Pan Yew En Koen (SGP)