By Neha Aggarwal
Qualification stage concludes
The top seeded players in the Junior Boys’ Singles group stage sailed smoothly into the knock out stage on the first day of the 2016 Serbian Junior and Cadet Open- ITTF Junior Circuit in the city of Vrnjacka Banja. Rashed Sanad Rashed (Bahrain), Mohammed Abdulwahhab (Qatar), Jiri Martinko (Czech Republic) and Klos Patrik (Czech Republi) are the top four seeded players who won all three of their group matches to progress to the round of 32.
However, there were few surprises, in groups 5 and 12. Francisco Jose Pedro (Portugal), seeded five in the Junior Boys’ Singles secured second position the group 5 as he lost to Henin Valentin (Belarus) 2-3. He beat Milos Marinkovic (Serbia) 3-0 and Petrov Martin (Bulgaria) 3-0. Henin won all three matches and thus qualified at the number one spot.
In group 12, results were totally unexpected as Al-Malki Nawaf (Qatar) seeded number 12 finished at number three, loosing two out of three matches. Stefan Odorov (Bulgaria) created a massive upset winning all three matches and thus securing top position in group 12 and qualifying for the knock out stage. Host nation’s Bence Bognar also progressed to round of 32 as he secured second position in same group.
Top two players from each group qualified for the round of 32 which started later in the day.
Serbia challenged in opening round of last 32
Out of the 24 players to qualify for the second stage, seven players from Serbia made the cut. However, moving forward only two progressed to the round of 16. In the opening rounds, Florian Fenyvesi Florian (Serbia) defeated Todorov Stefan (Bulgaria) in a full distance duel (11-8, 11-7, 11-5, 12-14,8-11,5-11, 7-11) and thus moved to the round of 16 where he meets Romania’s Paul Mladin.
The second Serbian to progress to last 16 stage is Aleksa Gacev who received a bye in the opening round. He next meets Filip Radovic Filip (Montenegro) who knocked out Serbia’s Bene Bognar in five games (11-6, 11-3, 11-7, 9-11, 11-4).
Top seeded Sanad Rashed (Bahrain) will start his campaign in the second stage as he plays against Tomas Martinko (Czech Republic) in the round of 16. Second seeded in the Junior Boys’ Singles Mohammed Abdulwahhab (Qatar) will play Portugal’s Jose Pedro Francisco at 10:15am local time.
Junior Boys’ Doubles commence
Serbian pair of Aleksa Adamovic and Niksa Martinovic progressed to the quarter final stage as they defeated the pair of Vitor Amorim (Portugal) and Paul Mladin Paul (Romania) in a hard fought (10-12, 11-9, 13-11, 11-9) victory. They will now compete against the strong pair of Qatar’s Mohammed Abdulwahhab and Mohd Abdulaziz in the quarter finals.
In the bottom half, second seeded pair of Flip Radovic Filip and Rashed Sanad Rashed will play the Serbian pair of Matija Jovicic and Milos Marinkovic Milos in the quarter-finals.
All eyes on day two as the winners and runners up of the Junior Boys’ Singles and Junior Boys’ Doubles will be determined.
More information:
- Junior Boys’ Singles (Qualification)
- Junior Boys’ Singles (Round of 32)
- Junior Boys’ Singles (Consolation)
- Junior Boys’ Doubles (Round of 32)
The IN
