On day one of the YONEX Polish Open 2019, two of New Zealand’s players were competing for a place in the main draw. Abhinav Manota competed in the men’s singles and men’s doubles alongside his partner, Oliver Leydon-Davis.
Abhinav started with his men’s singles campaign against India’s Kiran George. George got off to a head start in the first game and didn’t look back to storm away with the first game. Manota managed to keep the score level for the first half of the second game, but Kiran eventually ran away with the win:
- Kiran George (IND) vs Abhinav Manota (NZL) 21-10 21-15
Manota later redeemed himself with a win in the men’s doubles alongside fellow compatriot, Oliver Leydon-Davis. The pair overcame the German fourth seeds in qualification, to set up a second round match to qualify for the main draw. However, the pair narrowly lost out to the Scottish brothers in two frustratingly close games:
- Oliver Leydon-Davis/Abhinav Manota (NZL) vs Hauke Graalmann/Patrick Scheiel (GER) [4] 21-14 21-15
- Christopher Grimley/Matthew Grimley (SCO) vs Oliver Leydon-Davis/Abhinav Manota (NZL) 23-21 21-19
“Disappointing day with our performance in the second match, played fine in the first one but couldn’t get it done when it counted. We’ll make some adjustments over the next few days and prepare as best as we can for Finland next week” – Oliver Leydon-Davis.
“Definitely not the results I was hoping for in Singles and Doubles but it’s all part of the learning process. I believe we will take this experience in our next tournaments. Our best is yet to come!” – Abhinav Manota
The pair will be competing in the Finnish Open 2019 and the 20th VICTOR Dutch International 2019 over the next two weeks.
You can view all of the results from the YONEX Polish Open 2019 on Tournament Software.
