The women’s singles provided two of the biggest upsets of the day, the biggest of which was third seed Anna Rice falling to the unseeded Wang Linling. The match was very up and down with Wang winning in three games 21-15, 6-21. 21-9. The other big surprise in the women’s singles was the defeat of Christina Aicardi from Peru to Canadian Denyse Julien. The 49 year old proved once again that she is not to be underestimated as she won in three long games 21-14, 21-23, 21-18. The two big matches to watch tomorrow will likely be Nicole Grether from Germany taking on Japan’s Oka Hitomi, and Michelle Li from Canada taking on Jeanine Cicognini from Switzerland.
The men’s singles lacked any major upsets in spite of Dan Kai from Canada easily defeating USA’s Nicholas Jinadasa, and Ikeda Yuichi of Japan’s similarly easy win over Canada’s Alex Pang. Both were upsets on paper, but there was no doubt who the stronger players were in those matches today. Other than Dan Kai Canada has two other hopefuls remaining at the quarter-final stage with Stephan Wojcikiewicz winning over Timothy Ma, and David Snider pulling out a great performance against Malaysia’s Lee Hock Lai winning 21-17, 14-21, 21-18. They will now meet Daniel Paiola and Kristian Midtgaard respectively.
The only doubles event to take to the courts today was the men’s doubles event as both the womens doubles and mixed doubles events will be starting their first rounds tomorrow. There were a handful of close matches, perhaps the most surprising of which was recent Canadian national champions Jon Vandervet and Alvin Lau narrowly escaping defeat against the pick-up pair of Daniel Pastewka and Tommy McKee. After splitting the first two games Lau and Vandervet trailed by ten points in the final game, but managed to comeback and take the match 18-21, 21-11, 23-21.
Tomorrow will feature some more exciting matches and we can expect some more seeds to start falling so check back in for more results soon.
Although a little late in coming, the draws for the Atwater Canadian International 2010 have been released. Apparently the Pan American organizers had their laptop stolen at the recent World Junior Championships which delayed their publication of the draw.
Top seeded Brice Leverdez faces Zhang Kailai from Canada who may be unseeded, but recently immigrated from China so the top seed could be the first favourite to fall. Other strong favourites for the mens singles title include second seed Canada’s Stephan Wojcikiewicz, third seed Kestutis Navickas, and a handful of other seeds. Perhaps the most dangerous dark horse in the draw is Japan’s Ikeda Yuichi who won the recent Peru International.
Nicole Grether from Germany is the top seed gunning for the womens singles title. Similar to Leverdez in the mens singles Grether has a tough first round against Canada’s Phyllis Chan. On the far side of the draw is Jeanine Cicognini from Switzerland who plays Canada’s Valerie St Jacques. Other notables include Anna Rice, Michelle Li from Canada, and Claudia Rivero from Peru, Oka Hitomi and Ito Kana from Japan.
Almost an exclusively Canadian event, however both the first and second seeds are non-Canadian with Dutch players Ruud Bosch and Koen Ridder as first seeds, and Americans Phillip Chew and Halim Haryanto as second seeds. Recent Peru International winners Derrick Ng and Adrian Liu will be gunning for the second ever international title, they are the third seeds. Fourth seeded Maxime Belanger and Francois Bourret will be looking to make an impact, and unseeded Canadian national champions Jon Vandervet and Alvin Lau are also looming threats.
The German/Canadian duo of Nicole Grether and Charmaine Reid are the top seeds once again after cruising to a straight forward win in Peru recently. As in Peru the second seeds will be Peru’s Christina Aicardi and Claudia Rivero. Both the seeded pairs have challenging first rounds matches. Grether and Reid will likely face the recent Canadian national champions Melody Liang and Jiang Xuelian. The Peruvian second seeds have a possible match up against Michelle Li and Alex Bruce.
In the mixed doubles we have yet another near exclusive Canadian draw with only three pairs not featuring a Canadian player. Top seeded Canadians Toby Ng and Grace Gao will be looking to take their first ever international title, however there are a number of other pairs threatening the title. Perhaps the most threatening are Canadian national champions Jon Vandervet and Milaine Cloutier who are unseeded.
Guatemala’s Kevin Cordon wasn’t able to live up to his top billing in the mens singles event as he was ousted by Japan’s Yuichi Ikeda in the round of sixteen, 19-21, 21-10, 21-10. The relatively unknown Japanese shuttler followed that up with another win over Canada’s top player Alex Pang 21-13, 21-17. Yuichi will now face Peru’s Antonio De Vinatea who defeated his teammate Rodrigo Pacheco in a close three games 21-23, 21-19, 21-18. The bottom half of the draw features the only seed to survive to the semi-final stage of the mens singles with second seed Daniel Paiola coming through relatively comfortably with a win over Mario Cuba 21-15, 21-18 to set up a semi-final clash with another Japanese player Hiroyuki Saeki.
The Japanese struck again in the women’s singles where Manami Ebuchi defeated the top seeded Nicole Grether in two close games 21-19, 21-18 to set up her semi-final match against Canadian youngster Phyllis Chan who upset third seeded Canadian, and Grether’s partner, Charmain Reid 21-19, 21-19. The bottom half of the draw will feature fourth seed Anne Jensen Held against Michelle Li who upset the second seed Anna Rice, and seventh seed Christina Aicardi.
The mens doubles featured some strong performances from the local Peruvians with two teams making it through to the semi-finals. Top seeds Antonio De Vinetea and Martin Del Valle made it through comfortably defeating their teammates Pablo Aguilar and Ignacio De Vinetea 21-14, 21-14. They will now face Canada’s Derrick Ng and Adrian Liu. The other Peruvian team on the bottom of the draw, Andres Corpancho and Rodrigo Pacheco face Japan’s Hiroyuki Saeki and Hajime Komiyama.
For full results visit the link below: