MANILA, Philippines –The country’s junior tennis woes extended to the doubles competition Thursday.
Chinese Taipei’s Lo Chien-hsun and Meng Cing-yang eliminated the top local combination of Alberto Lim Jr., and Fil-German Boris Klingebiel, 4-6, 6-2, (10-7), a day after all Filipino singles bets were wiped out in the Mitsubishi Lancer international junior tennis at Rizal Memorial Tennis Center.
Lim and Klingebiel obviously lacked familiarity with each other’s game, allowing their opponents to force a super tiebreak by letting down their guards in the second set of their first round match.
They even led in the race-to-10 tiebreak, 6-4, but Lim blew several shots at the net that proved disastrous for the partnership.
Three other Filipino combinations bowed out along with 15-year-old Khim Iglupas and 16-year-old Roxanne Resma, who lost to eighth seeds Rosie Cheng of New Zealand and Ye QiuYu of China, 6-1, 6-0, in their first partnership in the girls’ doubles.
Sameer Kumar of United States and Sharmal Dissanayake of Sri Lanka dealt Jerome Romualdez and Stefan Agustin Suarez a 6-1, 6-0 defeat, while fifth seed Rhett Purcell of Great Britain and Alexander Klintcharov of New Zealand crushed Dave Mosqueda and Eric Olivarez Jr., 6-0, 6-1.
Also losing their first round match were Vince Russell Salas and Joachim Samson, who took a 6-2, 1-6 (10-7) decision from Jake Delaney of Australia and William Matheson of New Zealand.
In boys’ singles, top seed Harry Bourchier of Australia drubbed Teeradon Tortrakul of Thailand, 6-2, 7-5, to reach the quarterfinals, where he will face seventh seed Oh Chan-yeong of Korea, who repulsed Dissanayake, 7-5, 6-4.
Mandresy Rakotomalala of France, who upset second seed Ken Onishi of Japan in the second round, continued his march by beating Canada’s Jack Van Slyke, 6-4, 7-6 (7-3). He will next take on Purcell, who stunned fifth seed Chung Yun-seong, 3-6, 6-3, 6-3.
Top girls’ singles pick Katie Boulter of Great Britain encountered rough sailing before beating Maddison Inglis of Australia, 7-5, 0-6, 6-4, to forge a quarterfinal duel against Ye, who dumped Huang En-pei of Chinese Taipei, 6-2, 6-1.