Finals day commenced with the mixed doubles, where both pairs started rather hesitantly with lots of unforced errors and substandard services. Newly formed pair Piek and De Ruiter recovered the best from their tentative beginning and made sure they were on top at the first break, leading 11-6. Especially the powerful smashes of De Ruiter were unanswered by his opponents most of the time.

The Singaporean pair stepped up their game and took a first-time lead in the match at 18-17. Their experience didn’t really help them, as they bargained away no fewer than 5 game points, whereas the Dutch duo only needed one, to eventually prevail 25-23.

In a fascinating contest inside the match between Piek and Lei, the latter took the upper hand at the net at the start of game two, enough to seal the win 21-16. In the decider, the experience of the Singaporean pair reigned over the enthusiasm and fighting spirit of their Dutch adversaries, resulting in a 21-14 victory.

“Now we’re still a bit disappointed. In the second and third game they played more cleverly. But within a few hours, we’ll be very happy with this match, but also our three previous matches in our first tournament together,” explained De Ruiter just after his match.

“They play bigger tournaments, reached the quarters at the World Championships and are more experienced. Our coaches are still trying to find out the best possible combinations within the Dutch team, normally they’ll be announced after the Dutch Open.”

The technical perfection Olga Konon is able to produce is a sight for sore eyes, and she executed this flawlessly today. After just 14 minutes, the German shuttler crushed her rival 21-14. Each woman had won two of their previous encounters, although there was no doubt that Konon was the [...]

The first round of the men´s singles was a real battle field for the seeded players. First seeded Wacha had an off day and the same applies to 4th seeded Wong, who did not manage to defeat the German Nicolai Persson. For the young qualifier, this victory meant the biggest success in his career so far. Furthermore, 8th seeded Lo Ying Ping (FR) got beaten by another qualifier Chun Seang Tan (MY). All other seeded players needed3 sets to continue to the next round. Promising for the next rounds of this tournament! The women´s singles saw less surprises. Judith Meulendijks (NL) defeated 6th seeded Chloe Magee (IE) and Larissa Griga (UA) beat Belgium´s hope Lianne Tan in three sets. An error by the referee caused Lianne to lose her focus and subsequently the match. Elizabeth Cann seized victory over Julia Wong and is right on track for the finals. German Olga Konon, a candidate for the tournament victory, was all over the court, easily pushing on to the next round. And Carola Bott managed to surprise 7th seeded Jiayuan Chen in two sets. The laws of ´Survival of the seeded players´ are being respected in the men´s doubles event. Only 4th seeded Croatians Zvonimir-Zvonimir were surprised by Singapore couple Chrisnanta-Triyachart. Belgian pair Dierickx-Golinski was not consistent enough towards the end of each set. The other duo Gillis-Moreels were running behind the facts against Polish Cwalina-Logosz (first seeded). The women´s doubles saw lots of walk-overs (6). This allowed two Belgian pairs to continue to the second round. All seeded players though did not encounter any issues and easily made it to the next round. And finally the mixed doubles. None of the couples Vervaeke-Demy, Dierickx-Janssens and Gillis-Devooght made it to the next round. All seeded pairs confirmed their ranking, but we [...]

After 2 long days, Sportoase is ready for the tournament. We would like to thank our team of volunteers who worked very hard to get this done on time.

The first match starts at 10:00, we hope to see you there!

The tournament has not yet begon or we lost already a good candidate for the title Joachim Persson. Persson is injured and is not able to play at the Belgian International. More news later…