YONEX-SUNRISE BWF World Championships '09 - Tago takes centrestage

Entering the second round of the World Championships could be Tago’s best result in 2009. The young Japanese has shown great potential but unfortunately, the results have not been encouraging this year.

As for Persson, the Dane had hinted that he was in good form before this event, but it wasn’t his day, while Tago had given a special attention to this particular match. “I had prepared well for this competition and this match especially. I had watched a lot of videos of Persson as I had never played him before,” said Tago.

“And even if I had watched him in other tournaments we both played in, I was quite surprised with his strokes today. He played better than I expected so I had trouble adjusting to his game at first.“

Obviously, the Japanese found the way in the second game after the loss of the first one 16/21. In the two others game Tago kept in the lead after the first few points were played. Attacking much earlier in the rallies yet not making any mistakes, he was slowly out powering his opponent, who didn’t seem to find any solutions.

He won the second and third games 21/14, 21-13 respectively.

It was also a tough day in the office for Thailand’s Boonsak Ponsana and Korea’s Park Sung Hwan respectively.

Park Sung Hwan, former Asian Champion, struggled against Steinar Klausen of Norway, having to play overtime in the decider for a final 19/21 – 21/13 – 21/18 victory. A strong after match briefing from Li Mao will certainly help him into his second round against Jan Jorgensen of Denmark, who watched the game from the stands as he had a walkover in the first round.

Boonsak Ponsana didn’t have much of an easier day against Lithuania’s Kestutis Navickas. The trainee from the Germany-based BWF academy worked wonders until 14/14 in the decider – both players had won one game each before that – but Boonsak’s experience prevailed and the latter was finally off with a 21/14 – 14/21 – 21/17 win.

“He is a strong fighter and I had some problems today. I usually play quite badly at the world championship, losing in early rounds, so, hopefully I will try to go further this time,” said the Thai. “But my draw is difficult. If I beat the player from New Zealand (Wu), I will have to play against Park Sung Hwan and then, if I win, against Taufik, so, it will be difficult,” added Ponsana.

Talking of which, the former Olympic champion was all smiles after his quick win over Christian Boesiger from Swizerland 21/14 – 21/14. Chen Jin also didn’t have much trouble entering the second round with a clear success over Eric Pang 21/14 – 21/19.

Tony Gunawan and Howard Bach are quite familiar with this competition. As a matter of fact, they have already won it, in 2005, in their home of Anaheim. And for their first match against Lee Wan Wah and Choong Tan Fook, the Malaysian veterans, they had to dig deep to beat their opponents as it was one of the highlights of the day.

The Americans took the first game rather easily – leading from start to finish for a 21/15 success before Lee and Choong caught back at one game all 21/18. The third game looked like a one sided story – especially when Bach and Gunawan led from more than 5 points, but the Malaysians once again got even at 20/20 before the former World Champions finally won 23/21.

“We were very lucky towards the end as we should have won before, but we made stupid mistakes” said Gunawan in a smile. “We’re not really thinking of another title as we’re just back together as a pair for this year. It was already a miracle that we got it in 2005, but now, we are four years older and not as quick as before.”

Not much more luck for the other Malaysian old pair of Chew and Chan, who got stunned by former singles player Shoji Sato and his partner Naoki Kawamae. The Japanese won in three tight games.

Posted by Lucas Liau on 9:30 AM. Filed under News . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0