Nicholas Lum, 19, is Australia’s highest ranked men’s table tennis player with a world ranking of 38. His close friend and long-time doubles partner, Finn Luu, 19, is ranked at 44.
As 17-year-olds they narrowly missed a medal in the Men’s Doubles competition at the 2022 Birmingham Commonwealth Games.
They met as eight-year-olds and have played with and against each other for 11 years. They will represent Australia in Men’s Singles and in the Men’s Team event at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games.
Finn Luu
“I first met Nick at a junior tournament at MSAC. It was 2013. I was eight years old.
He was new on the scene, and I played him for the first time and beat him quite comfortably. I didn’t think too much more about it.
As it turned out, it was the only comfortable win I’ve had over him.
Initially, he was the dog biting at my tail. He was behind me but improving quickly and he started to give me a real challenge. It wasn’t that we disliked each other but in those early days we only met as opponents and were rivals. We didn’t really know each other.
But then we played together at the Pacific School Games in South Australia in 2015.
We were on the same team. There was a team environment, and we had the same purpose. We travelled together and it offered us the opportunity to talk as friends and not rivals.
In 2019 we started going overseas a lot together, the two of us and the national coach of the time, John Murphy. We were quite young, and it was just us. We had to lean on each other through long stints in Europe, for example.
We were 14 or 15 and growing up together, as players and people. I feel that was when we became solid.
Generally, Nick is calmer and more rational than I am. I tend to act in the moment, which is something I’m trying to work on.
If I compare myself to him, his ability to keep things clear and uncomplicated is something I can take from him. He keeps a very level head. I’ve seen him in tense and very stressful situations and in those moments, he methodically applies himself to getting the job done.
He’s very easy going. In a lot of ways, we’re opposites. I tend to be more reserved and serious than he is. But what we have in common is what’s most important.
For example, while we are fierce rivals – only one of us can win any tournament we play in – there is an understanding that every time we play each other there is nothing more than a result at stake. Our friendship isn’t challenged by who might win on any given day.
Away from table tennis, if it’s not talking about stupid stuff, we tend to help each other out with life’s issues. Because of the similarity of the lives we’ve chosen, we can understand what the other is going through. At times I feel I know what’s on his mind without a word spoken.
We went to Europe for training stints at the end of 2021 and in 2022 we were selected to play together in the Commonwealth Games. We were 17 years old and it was our first big event. We went in without any expectations and we made the semi-final, beating some quality opponents along the way. It was a personal and sporting high point.
Then, in 2023 Table Tennis Australia presented us with the opportunity to live and play in Germany and we were definitely more comfortable with the idea of living there if we were there together.
The opportunity to train and play at a European standard was going to help our games, we knew that, but knowing that we could share the experience and lean on each other if things got tough made the opportunity even more attractive.
Our circumstances have changed since then. We’re in different parts of Germany and really only see each other every couple of weeks at tournaments. We tend to coach each other and help the other when we do meet at tournaments.
We’re in touch every day but at the moment, because of our different schedules in Europe, we see each other most frequently back home in Melbourne. We’ll train together, come into the VIS together and hang out socially in our downtime.
Our doubles partnership started off as a convenient thing to do, because we were the best players in our age categories. But as we worked through the age groups we developed into one of the best doubles pairings in the country and now that we’ve been playing together for so long, and have such a good understanding on and off the table, it’s something valuable we have. An advantage.
Nick was the first person I called when I got the news of my selection for the Australian Olympic team. Qualification turned out to be a bit tricky for me. He knew he was in. I didn’t know I was in until a little while later.
The day I found out we had been at the VIS, in the gym. Nick had to go early and I was on the tram going home on my own. I was refreshing my emails every two seconds and when the news came through from Table Tennis Australia I couldn’t call him quick enough.”
Nick Lum
“The first time I met Finn I was intimidated. He was a bit of a big deal. The top dog. We played for different clubs and there was a lot of rivalry between clubs back then and he had this gang around him. His club was strong and very professional. The rest of us were, to a degree, in awe.
Once I got to know him a little, though, I felt welcome in his company.
The Pacific Schools Games – we were 11 or 12 at the time - allowed us to play in a team together for the first time. Ooohh…I have so many good memories from those games. Then we were in the same team at the 2016 national championships, in the under 13 team for Victoria, and we managed to win the championship.
From there, we took off. We knew that we were good for each other.
One of the main reasons why I have improved as a player is because I have played against and alongside Finn. The rivalry has helped both of us as players. One would win and the other would come back stronger and more determined, then the other would win.
People ask us about being friends and rivals but, for me, I have no problem winning or losing against him. Yes, a loss hurts, but we’re much closer than that.
Getting to that stage of friendship is not something that can be rushed. And it’s not always easy. It takes years of travelling together, sharing rooms together, playing tournaments together.
If I lose to him, I can be happy that he won. Whatever the result of our matches, we always debrief together. Talk about what happened and why. Sometimes we laugh about it.
Whether I win or lose against him, we’re still going to be best friends. Table tennis is part of our friendship – it brought us together – but we’re bigger than that. Closer than that.
As a player and person, Finn is the opposite of me.
He is very talented as a player, in that he has loads of options. He can adapt and be creative. He can throw all sorts of threats at you. In situations where he is not feeling confident, he is always a chance to come back because he has variety and creativity to work with. He’ll change things up. Not every player can switch things up like he can.
As a person, he is quick to come to a decision. I think of him as the boss. If we’re deciding what to eat for dinner, I’m not making that decision. He is. It’s always him deciding what time we’ll train or travel or eat.
I don’t like to get him angry because when he gets angry he gets very angry. I don’t like to go there. He stops talking when he gets angry.
Away from the table, we like to eat. In Melbourne, we train at Loops, which is in Sunshine West where there is some outstanding Vietnamese food.
We love buffets. We demolish a good buffet. When we’re on the road we’ll spend hours at a buffet, getting our money’s worth.
Going to Germany together in 2023 was a big step up for us. The motive was to settle and create a platform for our professional careers. Doing it with Finn, having someone to eat and talk and laugh with and understand what it was that we were doing with our lives, was really important. It was like having a brother by my side.
As a doubles team, we’ve been together for 10 or 11 years. He is a right hander so we have the coverage of a left/right combination.
On another level, being able to communicate freely, as players and friends, is a definite help to us. We can be upset about a point or disappointed over something but that is expressed, we can air whatever the issue is, because of the strength of our relationship.
That separates us from a lot of doubles pairs I have played with and against. You can put two good singles players together but the combination, the chemistry, that we have may not be there.
Finn’s qualification for the Olympics wasn’t straightforward.
At the trials, he came up just short. At the end of that day I spent time with him. We went to the VIS gym a few days later. We met on the tram and he looked devastated. I was confident he would be selected and I told him that. He was the man in form.
But the wait was difficult for him, obviously. And for me. But we’re now going to the Olympics together.”
