It was another relatively easy day at the office for Taufik as the Indonesian took just 30 minutes to beat England’s Carl Baxter, the third seed, 21-12, 21-12 to book his place in the final.
Taufik, preparing for the upcoming World Championships in Hyderabad, was in fine form and took firm control of the match to romp home in straight games. He will take on Chinese Taipei’s Hsueh Hsuan Yi who benefited from Canada’s fourth seed Stefan Wojcikiewicz retiring from his match in the third game. Hsueh lost the first game 21-15 but stormed back to level terms with an identical win the second game and at 14-13 in the third game, the Canadian retired, paving the way for the former to defy the odds to beat Taufik in the final.
In the women’s singles, Canada’s Anna Rice, the top seed, continued her march towards the title with a tough three-game win over Germany’s Nicole Grether. Anna needed more than an hour to subdue the German to finally take the match 18-21, 21-16, 21-17. Her opponent in the final will be local favourite Mona Susanto who prevented an all-Canada final by defeating Michelle Li 20-22, 21-17, 21-12.
Unseeded in the tournament, Mona took the fight to the more experienced Canadian and eighth seed, using her wider range of strokes to book her place in the final.
USA paid Howard Bach-Eva lee continued their great run in the championships with another solid performance to qualify for the mixed doubles final. Having done the difficult part by beating Tony Gunawan-Nantana Cee Ketputra in the quarter-finals on Thursday, Bach-Eva followed up with another resounding win over third seeds William Milroy-Fiona McKee of Canada.
The Americans won 21-9, 21-11 and will play Canada’s Alvin Lau-Jiang Xuelian, 21-16, 21-3 conquerors of Toby Ng-Grace Gao. Milroy was again on the receiving end when he and Toby Ng failed to stop Bach and Tony Gunawan from qualifying for the men’s doubles final. The Americans needed only 17 minutes, the shortest match of the day, to win in straight games, 21-15, 21-12. They will play Austria’s jurgen Koch-Peter Zauner in the final.
In the women’s doubles, it will be another USA-Canada final when Chen Ying-Grace Peng Huang Ruilin-Jiang Xuelian collide to decide the title. The Americans beat compatriots Priscilla Lun-Mesinee Mangkalakiri 21-16, 21-11 while Huang-Jiang beat Nicole Grether-Charmaine Reid (Germany-Canada) 12-21, 21-14, 21-11 in the semi-final.
Posted by Lucas Liau
on 11:36 AM.
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