Fathimath Dheema Ali

Fathimath Dheema Ali (; born 14 September 2007) is a Maldivian table tennis player. She qualified for the 2024 Summer Olympics, becoming the first Maldivian to qualify for the Olympics (previous entrants were on a quota) as well as the nation's first Olympic table tennis player.

Biography Fathimath Dheema Ali was born on 14 September 2007 in Sri Lanka, to Maldivian parents. When she was six, her father suggested she try out a sport, and after a badminton coach turned her down for being too short, she decided to try out table tennis. While on a break from school at age eight, in 2016, she entered a tournament in Malaysia and won the under-11 competition.

Later in 2018, Ali won silver at the South Asian Junior Table Tennis Championships in the under-12 event. For her performance, the Maldivian government gifted her 535,000 MVR and began funding all her training. In the Maldives Sports Awards 2021, she won third place for Sportswoman of the Year, Most Promising Young Athlete of the Year Award, and Best Sportswoman in Table Tennis.

In 2022, she competed at the Commonwealth Games, winning the first match before losing the second. During that year's Maldives Sports Awards, she won Sportswoman of the Year, Most Promising Young Athlete of the Year Award, and Best Sportswoman in Table Tennis. In the Maldives Sports Awards 2023 and 2024, she won the same awards as the previous years.

In May 2024, Ali won the singles event at the South Asian Qualification Tournament, thus qualifying her for the 2024 Summer Olympics. She became the first person to ever qualify for the Olympics from the Maldives, as previous entrants were through a quota.

In July 2026, Ali won the highest school education award by placing first globally and in Maldives in English in her Cambridge O-Level examinations. She is currently studying Business Studies at Taylor's University.