ITTF Pro-Tour: Austrian Open 2010- Yu Meng Yu Caused a Shock In The Third Round of Women’s Singles Event
The third round of Women’s Singles event at the Austrian Open in Wels was greatly upset by 21 year old Yu Meng Yu on Saturday 23rd October, 2010. She was seeded number 11 in an All Singapore Duel. Currently in this tournament of ITTF Pro-tour,
she overcame brilliantly the top seed Feng Tianwei and secured her berth in the quarter finals of the event. This result was totally unpredictable, as it was contrary to the outcome in the Women’s Singles final in the table tennis events of Commonwealth Games
in the Indian city of New Delhi, nine days before. On that magnificent occasion, Feng Tianwei won the match in five games very comfortably and professionally.
However, Yu Meng Yu’s exceptional performance in New Delhi presented more than a hint that she was capable of producing an unexpected and splendid result. As in the semi-final stage of Women’s singles event at Commonwealth Games, she defeated Wang Yue Gu.
That result predicted her forthcoming victories.
At Austrian Open, it was a fine win for Yu Meng Yu but Feng Tianwei was again hugely disappointed. She had been a heroine of Singapore after her most memorable success over China in May this year. It was final of Liebherr World Team Championships when she
defeated both Liu Shiwen and Ding Ning. But she stumbled on various occasions of ITTF Pro-Tour contrasting the expectations of her fans.
It is obvious that many players who compete on ITTF Pro-Tour pursue the task to reach the main draw. Anything they achieve other than the main task is a major bonus. However, for a player who attained the no.2 position in ITTF Women’s World Rankings in April
and retained her designation until the beginning of this month, the record on ITTF Pro-Tour has not been very impressive as she dropped suddenly to no.3.
Feng Tianwei had faced many surprises on several occasions. She made her debut in 2007 at the Volkswagen Open Korea in Seongnam. Since then she had won only two Women’s Singles titles in her 32 appearances. In 2009, she won in Korea and the year before in
Poland. However, it was her 11th time departure from the round of last 16 in Wels. This is highly unpredictable and no sensible person expects this from a player who had been in the top 10 of the World Ranking list since May 2008.
The praiseworthy victory from Yu Meng Yu was one of the two surprises in the third round of Women’s Singles event. The other one was upsetting regarding the world ranking but not so earth shattering in realistic terms. The no.21 seed from China Wu Yang is
the current World junior champion. She won the defenders’ duel by defeating Li Jie of the Netherlands in five games. Her ability to attack at the time of need proved crucial and brought this victory to her. Except this unexpected outcome, other matters of
the event went as the world ranking had predicted.
In the upper half of the draw, Li Jiao, Li Jie’s compatriot seeded no.14 beat the number 25 seed Chinese Taipei’s Cheng I-Ching. The no.3 seed from Singapore Wang Yuegu accounted for 15 year old Zhu Yuling from China, the no.12 seed. Likewise, in the lower
section of Women’s Singles draw, two Chinese, Li Xiaoxia and Guo Yue delighted their fans by winning. Seeded no.2, the former player defeated Singapore’s Sun Beibei seeded no.9 in four straight games. Similarly, Guo Yue seeded no.4 overcame Chinese Taipei’s
Huang Yi-Hua seeded no.18. However, the survival had been very difficult for Guo Yue, as she had to play the full seven games to secure a win. The final was decisive by the two point margin. Thus, it had been an interesting match till the very end.
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