by Simon Daish
Paskauskiene, seeded 31st, booked her passage to the last 16 in style, summoning up a wonderful performance from yesteryear to stun no.8 seed Galia Dvorak (5-11, 12-10, 11-9, 8-11, 11-5, 11-4), ending the Spanish player’s qualification hopes in Guimarães.
Another upset came courtesy of the player seeded six positions below Paskauskiene as Bulgaria’s Polina Trifonova, no.37 seed, came away with a fine first round win.
Trailing Sabina Surjan by a two-game deficit, a courageous response from Trifonova not only brought her back into the tie but eventually led to a noteworthy 4-3 victory over the no.20 seed from Serbia (11-13, 8-11, 11-8, 11-7, 9-11, 11-9, 11-9).
Suffering defeat in her opening match of the first knock-out tournament, it was a very different outcome the second time around for Czech Republic’s Hana Matelova with the top seeded competitor needing just four games to see off Swiss no.10 seed Rachel Moret (11-9, 11-6, 11-6, 11-7). Slovak no.2 seed Barbora Balazova also enjoyed a bright start to the second knock-out event, beating Croatia’s Mateja Jeger (14-16, 15-13, 11-7, 12-10, 11-8), to extend her stay.
Luxembourg’s Sarah De Nutte and Denmark’s Mie Skov also advance to round two following successful outings against Italy’s Debora Vivarelli (7-11, 11-2, 12-10, 11-7, 9-11, 13-11) and Czech Republic’s Karin Adamkova (11-8, 11-6, 11-7, 13-15, 11-5).
Two fixtures from the men’s singles draw were also contested, with Round of 16 places on the line.
The upset of the round saw Italy’s Mihai Bobocica, seeded 17th, upstage Great British no.12 seed Samuel Walker across five games (11-8, 12-10, 9-11, 11-6, 11-7). Meanwhile, Ukraine’s Yevhen Pryshchepa negotiated a significantly tighter affair, needing the full seven-game distance to beat Hungarian opponent Adam Szudi (12-14, 12-10, 7-11, 11-9, 9-11, 12-10, 13-11).
