(by Steve Hopkins)

The Singapore Smash’s Round of 64 began today, with half of the round’s action being played on Sunday and the rest on Monday.  Eight players fought through qualifying rounds to join nearly all of the World’s Top 50 in the Main Draw as all begin their quest for the 1.5 million USD in prize money. In early action in the Main Draw, Fan Zhendong topped Fin Luu 3-0, Lin Shidong topped An Jaehyun 3-1, Anton Kallberg defeated Canada’s Edward Ly 3-0, Tomokazu Harimoto defeated Ruwen Filus 3-1, Jonathan Groth defeated Noshad Alamiyan 3-1, Benedikt Duda slipped past Marcos Freitas 3-2, Liang Jingkun advanced 3-0 over Tiago Apolonia, Ma Long eliminated Alexis Lebrun 3-1, Patrick Franziska survived 3-2 over Simon Gauzy, Taiwan’s Feng Yi-Hsin topped Zeljko, Ovtcharov defeated Pucar 3-1, Ionescu won 3-1 over Sareen, Robles defeated Redzimski 3-1, Lin Yun-Ju defeated Gerassimenko 3-1, Mattias Falck defeated Oh Junsung  3-2, and Daniel Habesohn logged an easy 3-0 win over Pang Yew En Koen.

Some of the big names yet to play include Timo Boll, Quadri Aruna, Felix Lebrun, Jang Woojin, Darko Jorgic, Lin Gaoyuan, Dang Qiu, Truls Moregard, and Wang Chuqin.  Looking ahead, Fan Zhendong must play a dangerous Lin Shidong in the Round of 32.  If the top seeds all reach the Quarters, it would be Fan against Liang Jingkun, Ma Long against Lin Yun-Ju, Felix Lebrun versus Lin Gaoyuan, and Hugo Calderano versus Wang Chuqin. There are no Americans through to the Men’s draw, but USA’s Jinbao Ma was 1-1 in the Qualifying Rounds before falling to Ovidiu Ionescu.  Jishan Liang was 0-1 in his qualifer, losing to Marcelo Aguirre. 

Other players of note: Puerto Rico’s Brian Afanador and Daniel Gonzalez each finished 0-1 in the qualifiers.  Aditya Sareen – who lives in New Jersey but plays for Australia, fell in his opening round match to Ionescu – that is the only victory of a qualifier in the Main Draw thus far. On the Women’s side, Miu Hirano upset Hina Hayata in their opening round matchup.  Hayata is the top non-Chinese player in the world at No. 5, so one of the main challengers to the top Chinese fell on the first day.  The other top seeds that have played (only about half of the matches were played on Sunday) have advanced.  Chen Meng, Shin Yubin and Wang Manyu have each moved forward.  On Monday, USA’s Amy Wang will face Maria Xiao of Spain, USA’s Lily Zhang will face Japan’s Miwa Harimoto, and Puerto Rico’s Adriana Diaz will face Hana Matelova of the Czech Republic.

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