ITTF World Tour: Mixed fortunes for Singapore paddlers

Kicking off their season at the 2012 ITTF World Tour Hungarian Open, the Republic's paddlers saw a day of mixed fortunes at the US$35,000 (S$44,600) tournament at Budapest's SYMA Hall.

World No 14 Li Jiawei suffered an early scare against Sweden's Matilda Ekholm (No 69) in the women's singles round of 16 on Friday, losing the first game 11-9. But the 30-year-old bounced back to dominate the match and clinch victory 4-3 (9-11, 11-7, 11-5, 9-11, 11-3, 5-11, 11-6) for a quarter-final encounter against world No 2 Li Xiaoxia of China on Saturday.

However, there was no such luck for Li and team-mate Sun Beibei, who failed to advance after the Singaporean pair were defeated 3-2 (11-13, 8-11, 11-9, 11-9, 11-9) by Dana Hadacova and Katerina Penkavova of the Czech Republic.

Over in the men's doubles, Yang Zi and Zhan Jian failed to land a semi-final spot after a 4-0 loss to unfancied Turkish opponents Ahmet Li and Bora Vang.

Singapore's second doubles pair of Gao Ning and Li Hu crashed out of the round of 16 after a 3-1 loss to Benjamin Rogiers and Yannick Vostes of Belgium.

The Republic's remaining men's singles representative, Zhan Jian, was also eliminated on Friday after he was defeated 4-1 by three-time Olympic gold medallist and world No 7 Ma Lin (China) in the men's singles round of 16.

ORIGINAL SOURCE
Content used in this not-for-profit blog remain the property of their respective owners.