Day two began with the Tjonadi sisters, who are juniors from New South Wales, playing against the Aimsaard sisters from Thailand. With a world ranking of nine, the Thai women outplayed their younger opponents, showing their superior ability in the 23-minute match.
Setyana Mapasa and Angela Yu had a storming start to their women’s doubles campaign at the SATHIO GROUP Australian Open 2023. With a current world ranking of 71, Mapasa and Yu came out with determination and confidence against the much higher ranked pair from Japan. Rui Hirokami and Yuna Kato who have a world ranking of 24, seemed a little shell-shocked with the Australian’s performance in the first game, but quickly turned the tables in the second to take the match to a third and deciding game. Mapasa and Yu had their chances and match point, however could not consolidate on their opportunity to close out the 71 minute match.
Meanwhile, another Australian women’s doubles pair were in the hunt for a win on day two. Gronya Somerville and Kaitlyn Ea had a match up against German players, Linda Efler and Isabel Lohau, who have a world ranking of 35. Being the higher ranked pair, Efler and Lohau went about the task of eliminating the Australians from the draw with a convincing win.
In the men’s singles, two players who were hoping to move forward in the draw were Nathan Tang and Ricky Tang. Nathan Tang, who was given a wild card into the main draw, was excited to play against the young and upcoming Priyanshu Rajawat (IND). Not able to claim a win this time, Tang made the most of playing at his home tournament, relishing the experience.
Up against the tall Japanese player Zhao Jun Peng, Ricky Tang had a well fought match to open his main draw crusade. Keeping it close in both games, it was looking promising for Tang who at one stage in the second game was 15 all with Zhao. However, it was not meant to be as Zhao moved ahead to take the win with Tang taking much away from such a challenging encounter.
Tiffany Ho, who had also received a wildcard into the main draw had a big task ahead when she faced the number four seed from the USA, Beiwen Zhang. Although there were some great rallies, inevitably Zhang had too many tricks in her bag, in the end winning convincingly.
With opportunities for Oceania players to feature on day three of the SATHIO GROUP Australian Badminton Open fading, the four mixed doubles pairs that remained had something to prove. Fortunately for Rayne Wang, Angela Yu, Adrian Reynardi and Victoria Tjonadi, two of these players were guaranteed to play another day, having to play against each other. The pair to progress are Wang and Yu after a very exciting match against their compatriots.
In the other mixed doubles matches, Kenneth Choo and Gronya Somerville were unable to contain Lee Chun Hei Reginald and Ng Tsz Yau (HKG), going down in two games. Rizky Hidayat and Joyce Choong faced the same result in their match, with the more experienced Japanese pair securing the win and progressing to day three.
