Indonesian seniors, juniors advance to semifinals

Imanuddin, The Jakarta Post, Surabaya

Indonesian junior and senior players joined hands in their campaign at the Sanyo Indonesia Open badminton championship by securing tickets to the semifinals in the Kertajaya Badminton Hall here on Friday.

Unseeded junior Rony Agustinus had to play out three sets before crushing Thailand's only hope in the tournament, 10th seeded Ponsana Boonsak, 15-12, 11-15, 15-12.

Rony was the only one of Indonesia's three junior players who succeeded in the quarterfinals on Friday, with Taufiq Akbar Hidayat and Sony Dwi Kuncoro having to concede the supremacy of their respective opponents.

Despite raucous support from the spectators packing the badminton hall, promising Indonesian player Akbar failed to reach the semifinals after he was defeated by fourth seed Bao Chunlai of China.

Bao had previously prevented Indonesia's senior and top player Hendrawan going through from the first round of the singles competition on Wednesday.

Unseeded Akbar, who defeated his senior Marlev Mainaky in the last 16-round match on Thursday, surrendered 9-15, 8-15.

Sony lost to unseeded Chen Hong of China, who was the winner of last week's Singapore Open, in straight sets 5-15, 9-15.

Earlier in the mixed doubles, two Indonesian couples advanced to the semifinals.

Sixth seeded Nova Widianto and Vita Marisa proceeded to the next round after defeating Danes Jonas Rasmussen and Jane Bramsen 11-7, 11-1, while the senior but unseeded pairing of Bambang Suprianto and Minarti Timur moved ahead after defeating second seeds Michael Soogard and Rikke Olsen, also of Denmark, 11-5, 4- 11, 11-2.

But, the third Indonesian couple, unseeded Anggun Nugroho and Eny Widiowati, went down to first seeds Jens Eriksen and Mette Schjoldager 11-9, 2-11, 4-11.

Meanwhile, in the women's singles, top seed Camilla Martin of Denmark lost to sixth seed Dai Yun of China 11-7, 7-11, 5-11.

Fourth seed Zhang Ning, also of China, defeated Thailand's Sujitra Ekmongkolpaisarn 1-11, 11-8, 11-1, and Gong Ruina of China defeated seventh seed Kim Kyeung Ran of Korea 6-11, 11-2, 11-4.

Meanwhile, unseeded Xie Xingfang of China lost to fellow Chinese Zhou Mi 9-11, 11-6, 12-13.