(by Steve Hopkins)
Like top-seeded Chuqin yesterday, second-seeded Lin Shidong had no trouble logging a 3-0 win to move into the Round of 32. He will face Shunsuke Togami, who eliminated USA’s Kanak Jha earlier today. With Jha in the Men’s Draw and Lily Zhang and Amy Wang in the Women’s Draw, TeamUSA was represented – but none of our players reached the Round of 32 (with Zhang losing yesterday, and Jha and Wang falling today).
Yesterday, there were a number of upsets and today followed the same script. Tomokazu Harimoto fell 3-2 to 20 year old Chinese Qualifier Chen Junsong (No. 111). In the same section of the draw, Oh Junsung of the Republic of Korea upset Dang Qiu, perhaps making a path for an underdog to advance all the way to the Quarterfinals.
Felix Lebrun had no trouble advancing – he will face Chen Yuanyu, who knocked out Dimitrij Ovtcharov 3-2. Felix’s brother Alexis was not so lucky, he fell to Eduard Ionescu 3-1. Moregard, Assar, Uda, and Lin Yun-Ju all advanced as expected. Yuan Licen took out Anton Kallberg, and no moved on to face another Swede, Kristian Karlsson.
The Day 1 upsets included Benedikt Duda losing to Feng Yi-Hsin, Flavien Cotton over Xu Yingbin, and Milosz Redzimski over Lee Sang Su. Six of the top eight seeds have advanced, but we are assured some fresh faces and new match-ups as action proceeds through the week.
Lots of quality table tennis on tap all week long – we’ll have more updates soon.
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