Olympic champion Ma Long was a convincing winner on day one in Macau ©Getty Images

Both Olympic singles champions from Tokyo were in action on the first day of the World Table Tennis (WTT) Champions event in Macao.

China's Ma Long, men's Olympic singles champion at both Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020, traded games with Japan’s Yukiya Ida before closing out the match with two emphatic games.

Ma eventually won 11-9,13-15,11-3, 11-2.

His countryman and Olympic silver medallist Fan Zhendong, currently ranked number one in the world, is set to make his first appearance in the tournament on Thursday.

The opening day proved to be one of almost unbroken success for Chinese players.

The exception was an all Chinese encounter between Liang Jingkun and Lin Gaoyan.

It was a close contest until the fifth and final game.

Olympic women's singles champion Meng Chen experienced few alarms on the opening day in Macau as she beat Portugals Fu Yu in straight games ©Getty Images
Olympic women's singles champion Meng Chen experienced few alarms on the opening day in Macau as she beat Portugals Fu Yu in straight games ©Getty Images

Then Liang raced to an 8-0 lead before closing out the game to win the match 11-6,12-14, 12-10,10-12,11-2.

Later in the day, China's Wang Chuqin was pressed hard by Brazilian fifth seed Hugo Calderano, but eventually won 11-9,14-12,11-4.

In the women’s singles, Tokyo Olympic gold medallist Meng Chen swept aside Fu Yu of Portugal 11-5,11-3,11-7.

Chen Xingtong, a world team gold medallist with China earlier in the month, defeated 2019 Pan American Games gold medallist Adriana Diaz of Puerto Rico 11-6, 11-7, 11-9.

There was some consolation for Diaz when she came off court. 

Results elsewhere meant she had qualified for the WTT Cup finals in Xinxiang next week.

Japan's Olympic mixed doubles gold medallist Mima Ito came from behind to beat Sweden's Linda Bergstrom in four games 9-11, 11-8, 11-6, 11-6.

The competition which has a prize fund of $800,000 (£714,000/€818,00) continues until Sunday.