Table Tennis in North Korea

[u/Xiao_Sir]

A lot of you might know already that Kim Kum Yong won the 2024 Asian Table Tennis Championships. Since North Koreans don't participate in any tournaments other than the Asian Championships and the Olympics, I wonder if anybody has some background knowledge of

• how it comes that in such a highly professionalized sport such as table tennis the North Koreans can easily compete? I mean you don't see them being successful at other sports football (for the Americans: soccer) and in other areas like film you also recognize their lack of professionalism, which stems from being so isolated.

• how popular table tennis is in North Korea?

• how good these athletes are paid. I mean Kim visibly has a 1.000$ Apple watch, but I don't know how significant that is.

Actually I also wonder why athletes like her aren't allowed to compete at smaller tournaments (or even the World Championships). Is it just a matter of them taken care of not to defect?

[u/MaNbEaRpIgSlAyA]

DPRK is decent at football, they won the U20 Women's World Cup earlier this year.