Juergen Koch, Peter Zauner clear Men’s Doubles pre quarter-finals of US Open 2012
Men’s Doubles team Juergen Koch-Peter Zauner kept Austria’s hopes alive in Yonex OCBC US Open GPG as they secured a berth in the quarter-final round on Wednesday, July 4, 2012.
They ousted Calvin Lin-Marvin Lin of USA in a 34-minute tussle by registering favourable result of 27-25 and 21-11.
Though, the victorious couple wrapped the show in just two games, they had to face strong resistance from the opposing team.
Meanwhile, the local duo could not lock the honour despite putting an admirable show of badminton skills.
The opening game set overall tempo of the match as both contenders put all in their possession to gain an early advantage.
They chased each other all the way to final moments and the crowd remained glued to their chairs until last shot was played.
In the first half, Juergen-Peter launched a flurry of masterly crafted strokes and pushed their rivals on the back-foot with a 7-1 margin.
However, they could not carry this momentum in next couple of rallies and the local team managed to scale down their lead.
The Austrian pair perked up just before the interval and placed a respectable total of 11-9. They blundered again in crucial moments which allowed their competitors to step forward and catch them at 18-18.
Both teams stayed close in the final phase and turned this segment into a memorable contest. Three times they reached at game point position but could not hit the mark.
Finally, Juergen-Peter prevailed in ending three rallies and finished this race with 27-25 margin.
The US shuttlers, who showed splendid fighting spirit in the first set, surrendered tamely in next segment of the show.
This time they hardly gave any competition to their opponents and lost the crucial set with a huge deficit of ten points in the final figure.
Calvin and Marvin were leading until 4-1 but then couple of fatal mistakes triggered the collapse and they lost their grip over match.
Juergen and Peter did not miss this opportunity and bagged the first half with a decent total of 11-6 and then emerged as champions with 21-11 score on the board.
Now they are subjected to a tough trial as second seed Vladimir Ivanov-Ivan Sozonov will be their challengers in the quarter-final round.
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