The Chan sisters survived another second-set wobble to advance to the semi-finals of the doubles at the Toray Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo yesterday, while fellow Taiwanese Chuang Chia-jung avenged her doubles defeat to Japanese duo Misaki Doi and Nara Kurumi in the semi-finals of the Japan Open last week.
Second seeds Chan Hao-ching and Chan Yung-jan saved one of two break points and converted three of four to claim the first set of their semi-final 6-1, but then conceded three breaks and converted just one of four as Olga Savchuk and Xu Yifan rallied to win the second set 6-2.
The Chan sisters then fought back to claim the super tiebreak 10-8 against their Ukrainian-Chinese opponents in 1 hour, 11 minutes, the second straight match in which they were taken to the brink after comprehensively winning the first set.
Photo: AFP
The second seeds won 53 of the 103 points contested on Court 1 at the Ariake Coliseum to set up a semi-final against Eri Hozumi and Miyu Kato, who defeated fellow Japanese pairing Misa Eguchi and Junri Namigata in the first quarter-final played on Center Court.
Chuang and Kateryna Bondarenko completed a 6-3, 6-4 victory in 1 hour, 17 minutes in the final match on Center Court.
The Taiwanese-Ukrainian pairing saved four of five break points and converted three of five, winning 59 of the 103 points contested to set up a semi-final against third-seeded Spanish duo Garbine Muguruza and Carla Suarez Navarro, who advanced with a walkover.
In the singles, Dominika Cibulkova of Slovakia reached the quarter-finals by beating sixth-seeded Suarez Navarro of Spain 6-4, 6-4.
Cibulkova improved her record to 3-0 against Suarez Navarro, who had not won a match in seven tournaments before beating Bondarenko in the first round.
The Slovakian faces second seed Ana Ivanovic of Serbia, who defeated Camila Giorgi of Italy 7-5, 6-2.
Seventh-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska also reached the final eight by beating Elina Svitolina of Ukraine 6-4, 6-1 and will play Karolina Pliskova of the Czech Republic, who eliminated the last remaining Japanese player in the singles by defeating Nara 6-2, 6-4.
The 11th-ranked Pliskova served 10 aces and rallied from 4-1 down in the second set to clinch the match.
KOREA OPEN
American Sloane Stephens cruised past Japanese veteran Kimiko Date-Krumm to advance to the quarter-finals of the WTA Korea Open yesterday.
Third-seeded Stephens defeated 44-year-old Date-Krumm, champion in Seoul in 2009, 6-3, 6-4 in the second round of the tournament.
Meanwhile, Aliaksandra Sasnovich of Belarus, ranked 136th in the world, earned a surprise win over Magdalena Rybarikova, currently ranked 73rd, defeating the Slovak 6-3, 6-3.
GUANGZHOU OPEN
Denisa Allertova of the Czech Republic defeated top seed Simona Halep in straight sets in quarter-final play yesterday in the WTA Guangzhou International Women’s Open. Unseeded Allertova pulled off the biggest upset of the tournament so far, beating the Romanian 6-4, 6-3.
In another upset, unseeded Yanina Wickmayer of Belgium defeated Romania’s Monica Niculescu, the sixth seed, 6-2, 6-2.
Sara Errani overwhelmed eighth seed Zheng Saisai, China’s top player, 6-1, 6-0, leaving no more Chinese singles players in the event.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier