2019 Hungarian Open Recap
(by Steve Hopkins)
Budapest was host of the Seamaster 2019 ITTF World Tour,
Hungarian Open. The top four seeds in the men’s event were Fan Zhendong,
Xu Xin, Lin
Gaoyuan, and Hugo Calderano. The women’s event also included a
strong contingent of Chinese players with all of the top four tournament seeds
from that country: Zhu Yuling, Chen Meng, Wang Manyu, and Liu Shiwen.
In Men’s Singles,
the top four seeds all advanced to the quarterfinals. Fan Zhendong lost
the first game to a Kazak player named Kirill Gerassimenko, but was able to
outlast him for a 4-2 win. Fan then overcame Chuang Chih-Yan of Taipei
(4-2) to reach the quarters, and then defeated Russia’s top player, Alexander
Shibaev (4-1) to reach the semis. Xu Xing had tight 4-3 wins over
Germany’s Benedikt Duda and China’s Liang Jingkun to reach the
quarterfinals. He then logged a dominating 4-0 win over Korea’s Johghoon
Lim to reach the semis. Third seed, Lin Gaoyuan had tight matches
against other Chinese players in his first two matches, defeating Zhao Zihao
4-3 and then defeating Fang Bo 4-2. Gaoyaun defeated Vladimir Samsonov
4-2 to become the third top seed to reach the final four.
The upset of the
event was Hugo Calderano of Brazil who entered as the fourth seed, but who lost
in the quarters to China’s Wang Chuqin. Last year, Wang Chuqin made early
headlines as he climbed from No. 70 to No. 9 in the 18 Boy’s Word Rankings,
winning Gold at the Youth Olympic Games. This year, he is trying his luck
on the Men’s tour and after defeating World No. 6 (Calderano), he next test
will be World No. 1 Fan Zhendong on Sunday in the Semifinals.
After a pretty
straight forward quarterfinals round, the remaining matches were all
unexpected. World No. 1 Fan Zhendong lost to World No. 83 Wang
Chuqin. After Fan’s win in the first game, the match was slanted in
Chuqin’s favor. The key was that all three games decided by just 2 points
went to Chuqin. Chuqin over Fan 4-3 (-7, 7, 11, -5, 10, -3, 9).
The other semifinal
was between World No. 2 Xu Xin and World No. 4 Lin Gaoyuan. Gaoyuan won
the first game 14-12, and Xu Xin never recovered. The games were all
close, but Butterfly player Lin Gaoyuan dominated the result and posted a 4-0
win.
Gaoyuan’s final
followed the same script as his semifinal. He won the first game over
Wang Chuqin 13-11 and never looked back. Gaoyuan collects the first tour
title of 2019 in convincing manner and looks certain to move up to third in the
February rankings when they are released. Gaoyuan over Chuqin 4-0 (11,
10, 8, 9). Women’s Singles has been consistently less eventful than the
men’s events at the tour stops. The Hungarian Open was no exception as
the top four seeds all advanced into the semifinals exactly as expected.
Canada’s Zhang Mo was the only player from North America to make the knock-out
rounds – she fell 4-1 to Sun Mingyang of China in the round of 32.
Bernadette Szocs of Romania and Yu Fu of Portugal joined six Chinese players in
the final eight. However, with the exceptional play of the top seeds – it
was an all-China final four on Sunday.
The top two seeds
in the tournament, Zhu Yuling (World No.2) and Chen Meng (World No.4) each
advanced to the final. Zhu Yuling was pressed to the seventh game with
Liu Shiwen (World No.5), but won the deciding game 12-10 to advance. Chen
Meng handled her match convincingly, defeating Wang Manyu 4-1. The final
was the first upset of the tournament, with Chen Meng rallying to win the final
three games to pull out a 4-2 victory. Chen over Zhu 4-2 (-9, 7, -11, 11,
4, 5).
The Pan Am Cup,
Europe Top 16 Cup, and ITTF Challenge Portugal Open are all on the event
calendar for February.
Check in with
ButterflyOnline.com for all the latest news and results.
