(by Steve Hopkins)
A new generation of Chinese players continue to push their way to the front of the tour. Wang Chuqin is now firmly entrenched as World No. 2, Lin Shidong has moved all the way up to World No. 15, and in the event this week in Lagos, it was World No. 35 Zhou Qihao who finished on top.
The run for Qihao included upset wins over Benedikt Duda and Patrick Franziska to reach the Final. In the Final, it was all Zhou Qihao as he ran off three easy wins before Ovtcharov won the fourth. Qihao then closed the door with an 11-7 win in the fifth. Qihao’s third upset in the event – enough for the win. Perhaps more importantly for Qihao, this should put him in position to approach the Top 20. When you play for China, its hard to get playing time at the big tournaments. Right now Qihao is the 9th ranked Chinese player on the tour. After this win, he should jump up to 7th. With five Chinese players in the World’s Top 7, he still has some work to do – but he’s moving in the right direction.
In Women’s Singles, Shin Yubin entered as the top seed and advanced easily to Sunday’s Final. The other half of the draw was more of a mess with second seed Dina Meshref losing early (in the Round of 16 to China’s Li Yake). Yake went on to defeated Barbora Balozova and Wang Xiaotong on her way to the Final. Yake had a great run, but the top seeded Shin Yubin handled her relatively easily with a 4-2 win.
In Doubles, Xiang and Liu won the Mixed Doubles title for China in a match the was played on Saturday. Korea swept the two doubles finals on Sunday with Lim and Jang winning Men’s Doubles, and Jeon and Shin winning Women’s Doubles.
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