AUSTRALIAN OPEN 2014 R32 – Wei Nan Indeed

Unpredictably, some Australians proceed to Day 3 whereas none of the Danes competing today survived their opening rounds.

By Aaron Wong, Badzine Correspondent live in Sydney.  Photos: Yves Lacroix for Badmintonphoto (live)

Aussies advance

Despite the influx of top 10 players that have come to Sydney as a result of this event becoming a Superseries, the loudest applause of the day was reserved for the Aussies Renuga Veeran and Ross Smith (photo), who triumphed in a nail biting 23-21, 20-22, 24-22, over India’s Aparna Balan / Arun Vishnu, who are world ranked four notches higher at #52.

Veeran attributed part of the reason of her continuing career in badminton to changing service action from forehand to backhand since the Olympics: “It is the kind my partners prefer and they have been very encouraging [so the modification has been easy].”

Badminton turning into squash

Of the breed of men’s singles players who frequently find the time to stroll to reach shots around the court during the rallies, akin to squash professionals, three out of five advanced to Round 3 and the other two looked liked they would join the club, but it wasn’t to be.

Recent Singapore Superseries winner Simon Santoso and current World Champion Lin Dan decisively sealed the fates of their Japanese and Israeli opponents in straight games. Both Liew Daren and Boonsak Ponsana also thoroughly outclassed opponents in opening games but the latter forced a script change.

Malaysia’s Liew (photo) came up against his Thomas Cup nemesis Takuma Ueda of Japan and appeared mentally well prepared and strategically sound until the interval of the rubber game. By forcing a decider, the Japanese had sown seeds of self doubt in his opponent which bore fruits of slower reactions from 13-13 onwards. Sometimes pure doggedness is one immediate solution and thus Ueda defeated the more technically skilled Liew, 9-21, 23-21, 21-15.

Hong Kong’s Wei Nan (photo), whose name is a mandarin homonym for the phrase ‘make difficult’, lived up to this quality and copied Ueda’s time on court and solution to dispose of the Thai world number 9 for the third time this year, 13-21, 21-17, 21-16.

So much of success in badminton singles, like the best blackjack gamblers, is about having long term faith in one’s game plan as well as match rhythm; therefore, it is hard to judge whether these unlikely losers did anything “wrong” by going with self belief. Despite Denmark’s Viktor Axelsen capturing his second game against Son Wan Ho, the Korean maintained the same economical and focused pace of playing similar to Ponsana’s and Liew’s but came through 21-14, 19-21, 21-15.

Japan’s Kento Momota, who has been visibly improving month on month since he was in Sydney last April, took revenge in straight games for his recent India Superseries loss to Hans-Kristian Vittinghus, 21-19, 21-12, in what was a match up between world number 12 and 11 respectively.

First round ‘final’

In the longest match of the day, the other superstar to a country of a billion people, India’s Saina Nehwal (photo), remained determined after losing the first game and coming from behind in the second to eke out victory over China’s Sun Yu, 22-24, 21-17, 21-10, in 75 minutes.

“I wouldn’t call that a warm-up match. That was more like a final!” remarked the relieved Indian. “[Overall] I’m feeling good, I’ve trained hard and prepared well for the current season. I can’t have a holiday after this because the Commonwealth Games is up next.”

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