Circuit

Evans’ Title Defence Still on Track
Date: 12/6/2013 11:22 AM
Published by : Manuel Røsler

Irelands Scott Evans (pictured) got off to a dream start this afternoon in defence of his maiden European circuit title he lifted exactly 12 months ago. In the centenary edition of the Carlton Irish Open the Irish number one and 4th seed for the event got off to a dream start defeating qualifier Nick Fransman of The Netherlands before coming from behind in three sets against Frenchman Lucas Claerbout.

The weight of expectation is always immense for the Irish players in front of their home supporters and last year’s victory has heighten the expectation to a new level as Evans attempts to create Irish badminton history by securing back to back titles.

“Last year’s win was a big breakthrough for me and made all the more sweet given it was my first title after a series of final defeats” said a reflective Evans.

The world number 60 immediately found his grove in his first round match coming home in two games 21-10 21-17 before booking a quarter final spot against Lukas Schmidt of Germany with a battling second round win over Lucas Claerbout 15-21 21-5 21-13.

“I had the wrong tactic in the opening game against Claerbout. Even though I lost the opening game I was confident going into the second as I felt I had worked him out and played much better at the end of that first game”
In the second game it was pretty one sided after I got a great start and I knew once I got a good start in the deciding set that he no real dangerous attacking shots to hurt me with”

Speaking about his quarter final opponent Evans was quietly confident about his chances: “I played Schmidt earlier in the year at the German Open and won so I know I can do it again. I feel much better as a player now as I have been doing a lot of work with the legendary Peter Gade back in Denmark so I am looking forward to getting on court tomorrow”

Ireland’s top women’s singles player Chloe Magee followed Evans’ lead with a pair of wins over qualifiers Kosetskaya of Russia and Bland of England to advance to the business end of the tournament and teamed up with Brother Sam to justify their fourth seeding in the mixed doubles where they will play rising Dutch pair Selena Piek & Jacco Arends.

End of the line for Queen Carolina

Spain’s Carolina Marin the world number 14 and top seed for the tournament came unstack against the American based former Singapore player Beiwen Zhang as once again the classy Asian proved to be the Spanish stars bogey opponent.

In truth the recent London Grand Prix Gold and Scottish Grand Prix winner never really got out of the blocks on the court she lifted her first senior title as a 15 year old back in 2009. Las Vegas based Beiwen took less than 30 minutes to end the title dreams of the new darling of European badminton and in doing so set herself up as the woman to beat in Baldoyle this week.

Elsewhere the Baldoyle badminton centre continues to prove a happy hunting ground for the Dutch team as their doubles pairings led by Selena Piek maintained their 100% tournament record to book a hat trick of quarter final berths. The Dutch lifted all the doubles titles in 2012 and the inform combo of Piek and Muskens are looking to lift a hat trick of titles after victory in Scotland and the Bitburger Open’s over the past two months.

For all results from Dublin click HERE

To watch all the on demand action from day 1 go to Badminton Irelands YouTube channel and tune in from 10am tomorrow for all the live quarter finals action.

Article and Image courtesy of Mark Phelan (Live in Dublin)

©badmintoneurope.com. All rights reserved.

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