MS - 2nd round - The favorites continue their French journey

For a new day at Stade Pierre de Coubertin, the men’s singles players are back in action. After some huge disappointments where top seeds were taken down. Today, the other part of the draw did the job. A good day at the office as they would say !

Time for revenge for Axelsen

The world number one qualify for the quarterfinals after defeated in straight games (21/19 21/17) this opponent from Thailand Sitthikom THAMMASIN (n°36) Viktor keeps the head to head advantage up to 5-0. A good performance from the Dane that was not without difficulty. Viktor made unforced errors that help the Thai to come back from 15-20 to 19-20 in the first game. Nothing to worry about now, the world number one secured a good spot into the next round. “I didn’t feel at 110% out there, but really happy to manage to win in straight games on a day where I didn’t really feel that everything worked"

His next opponent is no other than LOH Kean Yew (n°5) from Singapore. He also won his ticket for the next round after a expeditious performance prevailing over the title holder from Japan, Kanta TSUYEYAMA (n°14) with just 40 minutes of play. 21/14 21/11.

The two actually train together and are good friends. They met last week in Denmark and Viktor is looking forward to playing this match.

“I lost last week (to LOH KEAN Yew), hopefully I will get my revenge tomorrow. I’m going to do my best to recover from today’s match and be ready for a good battle tomorrow.”

Quarterfinal’s gold tickets

To reach the next round at the Yonex French Open, players need to push even harder. These players enjoyed this one after such a battle on court.

Jonathan CHRISTIE reached the next round after his long confrontation with NG KA Long Angus from Hong Kong. An opponent he knows well as they met 10 times already! The Indonesian, 8th seed, needed 3 games to mark the last point. 21/17 8/21 21/13.

He will meet the Japanese Kodai NARAOKA who also qualify with troubles.

Another mentally challenged battle took place on court TV at the same time. It was Rasmus GEMKE’s battle against the Indian, former French Open Champ, KIDAMBI Srikanth, n°11. They put the public out of breath until the very ending. The Dane had a hard time passing this one but he can enjoy this victory even more.

LEE Cheuk You from Hong Kong also needed quite some time to pass this one. Facing WANG Tzu Wei, the Taiwanese stepped on court leading their head-to-head to 4 over 2 for LEE.

Huge confrontation between the two for about an hour.