[..INA's Andre K.T.??...KOR still has Park SHand he's still young.. Oh, the match just finished....Even the crowd support at the end is quite subdueb...[/quote] Both are over 21 now.........
Tago reminds me of Nishikori in tennis. Both are future stars in JPN with 19 years of age. The only difference is that the latter is more confident and solid in his groundstrokes and serves.
Agreed, Kei Nishikori is quite solid as a player. I hope he does better than Shuzo Matsuoka (no puns intended) or achieve better results than Kimiko Date or Ai Sugiyama or Naoko Sawamatsu
So the XD Final will be all INA??....i hope they'll show the match through livestream tomorrow...*gulp*
Team INA has one title in the bag tomorrow as Mohd Rijal/Vita Marissa beat Songphon Anugritayawon/Kunchala Voravichitchaikul in straight sets: 22-20, 21-18. A great result for the new pair! They will meet the top-seed Nova Widianto/Liliyana Natsir, who went through a tough match against the KOR youngsters Yoo Yeon Seong/Kim Min Jung 19-21, 21-17, 21-18. They appeared to have lost when they lost the first set and trailed 13-17 in the second set, only to come back strongly and win 8 pts in a row to force a decider. The KOR pair also had a 11-7 lead at the interval of the rubber-set, only to see that lead got overturned as well as the World Champion won the decider 21-18! What a close shave...it's time for Nova/Butet to win this Japan Open title, after losses in 2 straight Finals (2006 to Flandy/Vita and 2007 to Zheng/Gao)! Sony Dwi Kuncoro did not lose a set so far as he strolled to the Final, beating the host player Kenich Tago in straight sets 21-15, 21-16. He will face an uphill task possibly against Lee Chong Wei yet again, after being thrashed easily in the Beijing Olympics QF. So, INA will have at least 3 Finalists, with one more to be determined in the last match of the day, between Vita Marissa/Liliyana Natsir and Wong Pei Tty/Chin Ee Hui.
Live matches still on at Tokyo Metropolitan Gym...next match about to start ....our own LCW is playing..............
WPT/CEH have like a million to 1 chance of beating VM/LN. Poor records against pairs ranked higher than them. LCW, if he makes it to the finals, may face an uphill tasks. He said, he was sick few days before JO and he feels the fatigue. If that takes its toll, then he will be an easy opponent for SDK...:crying:
"Smartness" comes with experience Vita is also probably more error-prone than Grace.... Both Rijal and Grace will definitely need more playing experience against the top XD pairs like He/Yu and Nova/Butet. Hopefully splitting them up and pairing them with more experienced compatriots will accelerate the learning curve so that by the time they are paired up again (hopefully starting Malaysia SS next Jan), they will rise up to the top 10 quickly.
