ITTF Pro Tour: United Arab Emirates Open
Dubai: Thursday 17th February 2011
Qualifier Ousts Second Seed in Opening Round
China’s 21 year old WEN Jia caused the biggest shock of the third day’s play, Thursday 17th February 2011, at the United Arab Emirates Open in Dubai by beating Singapore’s second seeded FENG Tianwei. WEN Jia recorded a six games victory (4-11, 1-11, 11-9, 11-9, 11-3, 3-11, 11-3).
WEN Jia who beat FENG Tianwei Photo By: Atef Alghamery
The Girls’ Singles silver medallist at the World Junior Championships in both 2006 and 2007, WEN Jia has been absent from international table tennis for over a year and thus her world ranking has lapsed.
She was required to negotiate two days of qualification matches; she was beaten in her opening match by Japan’s Hiroko Fujii, progressed to a preliminary round where she narrowly beat Korea’s SEO Hyun Won to qualify for the main draw.
Defeat for the no.2 seed in the Women’s Singles event and there was a scare for the top seed in the second round of the Men’s Singles competition.
China’s MA Long trailed Korea’s 20 year old JEONG Sang Eun 6-9 in the deciding seventh game before winning five points in a row to secure victory.
MA Long won 5-11, 11-7, 11-6, 8-11, 11-5, 12-14, 11-9.
Otherwise, for the leading players in the Men’s and Women’s Singles events it was a successful day.
In the Women’s Singles competition the Chinese trio of GUO Yan (no.1 seed), LI Xiaoxia (no.3 seed) and GUO Yue (no.4 seed) progressed in style, as did the men who occupy the second to fourth seeded places.
All from China, WANG Hao, MA Lin and ZHANG Jike were never seriously troubled.
Meanwhile, in the Men’s Doubles event, top seeds Singapore’s GAO Ning and YANG Zi fell at the first hurdle losing the partnership of Serbia’s Aleksandar KARAKASEVIC and Bojan TOKIC (11-5, 11-4, 11-7), who proceeded to the semi-finals where they meet fourth seeds, China’s WANG Liqin and XU Xin.
In the counterpart semi-final it is an all Chinese affair; second seeds MA Long and WANG Hao face third seeds MA Lin and ZHANG Jike.
No great problems for the Chinese Men’s Doubles pairings but in the Women’s Doubles there was an unexpected defeat for DING Ning and GUO Yan.
They suffered a six games defeat (5-11, 11-7, 11-5, 11-7, 2-11, 11-7) at the hands of Korea’s LEE Eun Hee and PARK Young Sook.
At the semi-final stage they meet compatriots SEOK Ha Jung and YANG Ha Jun, the first round victors (11-8, 11-6, 11-5) over seconds seeds, CHENG I-Ching and HUANG Yi-Hua of Chinese Taipei.
An all Korean semi-final, with the penultimate round match in the opposite half of the draw, being all Chinese; top seeds GUO Yue and LI Xiaoxia meet LIU Shiwen and WEN Jia.
The latter duo caused a quarter-final upset by beating fourth seeds, Hong Kong’s JIANG Huajun and TIE Yana (11-4, 4-11, 11-7, 12-10, 6-11, 6-11, 11-7.
Source: ittf.com
