(by Steve Hopkins, photo WTT)
The first action on Friday went pretty much as expected at the WTT Star Contender Chennai. Tomokazu Harimoto started strong against Maharu Yoshimura, but Yoshimura fought back to even the score to 2-2 before Harimoto could squeeze out an 11-9 win in the fifth. The second seed, Hugo Calderano, lost the first game to Ho Kwan Kit before winning three straight to advance.
As the top two seeds fought through their first round matches, many of the other top players were less fortunate. Won Chun Ting was upset by Liao Cheng-Ting 3-2, Alvaro Robles was upset by Flavien Cotton 3-1, Yukiya Uda was upset by Snehit Suravajjula 3-2, and An Jaehyun was upset by Andre Bertelsmeier 3-1. As a WTT Star Contender Series event, this is designed to feature rising players – so perhaps some of these upsets can be attributed to strong players being under ranked/rated. That said, the lower ranked players saw a great deal of success in the Round of 32 on Friday.
The early Saturday Round of 16 brought even more surprises. Both of the top two seeds fell. Harimoto lost to Tomislav Pucar 3-1, with tight game scores. Calderano also fell, dropping the first two games to Lim Jonghoon then struggling to tie the score before losing the final game. Local favorite Sharath Achanta fell in the same round, losing to Snehit Survajjula 3-0. Sora Matsushima and Omar Assar were each upset as well with Marsushima losing to Flavien Cotton, and Assar losing to Oh Junsung.
Saturday evening will feature the Quarterfinals with Pucar versus Oh, Groth versus Cotton, Survajjula versus Poret, and Thakkar versus Lim.
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