U.S. Open 2008

Yep...

..that is the one and only Halim Haryanto in those pics...

..i believe she did qualify for both. She'll be playing WS and in WD with May M.

 

Quick review of tonight's QF round..

...well, the excitement keeps on building up (whatever much is left of it)...

Yep, as you all could see from the livescore/scoreboard, there were quite a few very exciting and very entertaining matches as well as finishes. I can count, from the top of my head, about 2-4 of them.

- Surprise of the day was Lee "Don't call me LCW" Hock Lai losing both of his matches. In his first match, which was the XD, Howard and Eva were all business as they took care of the match with much ease. With LHL trying to cover Priscilla, his XD partner, and the entire court, it was essentially easy pickings for the U.S.' #1 XD pair. They took it home, leaving LHL wondering if he could redeem himself in his upcoming MS match.

- Now, the first exciting match of the day was none bigger than the WS match pitting Eva Lee and Johanna Lee. And, yep, as reflected by the score's final tally, it did live up to its thrilling ending, as both sides never let up in their effort (despite the many arms at the hips and body bending breaks). It was wall to wall, sheer performance by both players. Suffice to say, despite the raucous support and cheer from the crowd, with one side screaming "Let's go Eva!" whilst the other yelling "Let's go Johanna!", at the end of the match, both players were pretty much gassed. In the end, Johanna's dream of seeking another chance of a U.S. Open WS Final appearance fell short. Still, a thumbs up for Johanna for giving it all, despite her age being much more senior than Eva.

- The second thrilling match of the day featured, yes, you all guessed it, another Lee. But this time, it was Lee Hock Lai, who was out to prove that he was ready to let go of his earlier XD match's loss. But who would've imagined that his opponent, Kevin Cordon, would pull one of the tourney's big surprises. When Cordon won the 1st game, everyone knew that LHL was in for a game. In the 2nd set, both players kept it tight until the end. And that's where all the jitters (by both the players as well as the fans who were supporting both players) came to play. With the score all knotted up at 20 a piece and LHL inches up to force a rubber set, Cordon pulled the night's big surprise by rallying (whilst holding 2 match points) to beat LHL. Cordon had a chance to close shop with his thundering smash, but the shot went into the net. Most of Cordon's pts, late in the 2nd set, came from LHL' unforced errors/lobs/lifts which sailed past the back line...
*The surprising thing was, when i passed the player's area, all i could see was him having a jolly good time (all laughing and taking it easy) with his coaches and a few other people, as if he didn't really care much about the losses.....
**For those PAWing for tomorrow's Semis, i would consider Cordon, as he has shown the most consistency and power in his game, amongst the others. His net and soft touch game has been consistent as well. At the moment, i wouldn't be surprised to see him reach the MS' Final.

- The last entertaining match of the day, arguably the most entertaining one of the night, involved the "An Uncle and his nephew" pairing. And boy, was it fun and entertainment.
Yep, it was none other than the match pitting 2 of INA's great baddy heroes, Rudy Gunawan and Halim Haryanto. But this time, i think the fun belonged to the former, as their match simply drew the biggest cheer, laughter, applause and support of the night. Everyone definitely had a good time watching this match, including the players who simply had fun playing and 1 goal in mind and that was to entertain the crowd. What with Rudy (nope, not our friendly huangkwokhau) still displaying, often times absorbing all of Halim's as well as Raju's powerful smashes, and giving it his all despite his much older physique (than the other 3 players). He even played to the crowd, as he waved to a section in the crowd during the match. At the end of the match, everyone knew who the winner was, and it was definitely the fans who watched the match. I sure enjoyed it and had a good laugh watching (and i'm sure our huangkwokhau (Rudy) would also enjoy it, if he was here)..

- I didn't see our smashie54 tonight, but saw a bunch of young folks from NorCal (Smash City??). Also saw BBC's owner, Ben Lee and his lovely wife and super adorable daughter.

- Better crowd tonight, although some people still feel the competition is lacking "top level competition".

- Oh, forgot to mention this, but the other night, i met with Bob and mentioned to him about his website. He's well aware of it and he said his upcoming appearance in the David Letterman's Show is, apparently, a taped show.

- Y'day saw some kind of reporter who interviewed both Raju Rai and Howard. I guess it's in preparation for the upcoming Olympics, in which those 2 players will represent the U.S.?!

Alrighty, i think that's the short recap for the time being....pics will be crawling out in a short while..

 

The Semi-finals preview???..

...i'll leave it up to you guys to preview it as i'm also as clueless as the rest of you folks.
I came in & watched today's matches confused and am still scratching my head, what with the surprising results...

 

Meant to write..

...with his coach, not coaches...(yes, for those waiting & can't wait to see LHL's ganteng (handsome) face, i have pics of him, to share)..

 

Yep...

..as of now, the U.S.' Olympic-bound squad consists of :
Raju Rai (MS)
Howard Bach (MD)
Bob Malaythong (MD)
Eva Lee (XD & WD)
Mesinee Mangkalakiri (XD & WD)
..i might be forgetting a couple others??..someone fill me in, please, if i do forgot..

* thank the camera & the lenses; they did all the hard work..

 

..actually Hau-ge was responding to aZn_Popcorn's query to Canada's players who will be training in INA...

..yep, correct...forgot to add those events & my mind is slowly falling asleep...

 

Day 3 pics - Can we see your face, Lee Hock Lai???..

..a lot of BCers (esp. from M'sia) would like to see what's with all the fuss behind that almost celebrity-like....err, i mean, badminton star name of Lee Chong Wei... A Handsome fella, eh...



a bit closer..


zoom in a bit more..


no, closer...


got it!..

 

Day 3 pics - Camera equipments at the 2008 U.S. Open..

....'What camera equipments???'.....

oh, btw, kwun, the 200mm lens that i was using was the reg. f/2.8. Not the uber fast f/1.8...
However, this gentleman (nope, it wasn't me, in the pics below) showed up last night & was carrying a bigger lens (a 300mm)...
I must say, he must be pretty tired lugging that canon around (actually he didn't take much pics, mostly just for the OCBC players). Probably the lens gave him much more than what he needed. He also carried a smaller lens, most likely a zoom lens (one of those white lenses); sorry, didn't take a pic of his other lens.







..more pics later..