At the opening day of the play at the European Olympic Singles Qualification in Guimaraes Portugal hope and anticipations are thick in the air and great pressure already took its toll on few favorites.
In Women’s Group A Sarah DE NUTTE of Luxembourg needed full seven games to beat Aikaterini TOLIOU of Greece but greatest upset came from Sibel ALTINKAYA of Turkey who beat Sarah 4:2 and secured good position before tomorrow’s last match in the Group. Leading name in Group B Debora VIVARELI of Italy faced similar faith. She overcame Tatiana KUKULKOVA of Slovakia before she lost to Charlotte CAREY of Great Britain seeded at the position no. three in the Group.
“Winning my first match here against VIVARELI was quite important. It was a win against a good player a higher ranked player. I was looking for causing an upset and I am happy with the result. Being low ranked in the group makes every match even in the group phase very difficult. I expect it will be difficult match tomorrow against KUKULKOVA. I do not want to think much further ahead. First goal is to pass the Group stage ” said CAREY.
Maria XIAO of Spain can go to sleep with memory of the perfect day. She secured passage to the next phase with two wins over Ozge YILMAZ of Turkey and Christina KALLBERG of Sweden. Both matches concluded in straight games. Galia DVORAK of Spain now depends on the outcome of the match between Nathalie MARCHETTI of Belgium and Solomiya BRATEYKO of Ukraine. Galia beat MARCHETTI but lost to BRATEYKO today.
In top four groups there are only three players whilst in remaining six are four in each. In Group E YUAN Jia Nan of France is at the top with two wins and tomorrow she will meet Sabina MUSAJEVA of Latvia who is ranked at the position no. four in the Group. In Group F Mateja JEGER of Croatia upset the rankings and overcame Izabela LUPULESKU of Serbia. In the same Group Mia SKOV of Denmark forced JEGER to go full distance before she lost but managed to overcame Anna KIRICHENKO of Finland. Another no. two in Group Giorgia PICCOLIN of Italy overcame the favorite. Rachel MORET of Switzerland concluded the day with one win and one defeat.
The tendency of players ranked at the position no. two beating the top players continued with Group H. Sabina SURJAN of Serbia has two wins and one is against Tin Tin HO of Great Britain. Tin Tin overcame Ana TOFANT of Slovenia to stay in the position to fight for one of two positions that leads to the next phase.
“It was very difficult match for me. I have never played against HO before but I knew what to expect. The bigger challenge was to play against TRIFONOVA; she has not enough points for higher rankings but she is playing in Bundesliga and she is very dangerous. I came from 0:2 in reverse to win 4:2. That was very important ” explained SURJAN.
In Group I top seeded Nadezhda BOGDANOVA of Belarus beat Airi AVAMERI of Estonia but lost to Karin ADAMKOVA of Czech Republic. That is not the only upset in that group since Prithika PAVADE of France ranked fourth overcame ADAMKOVA.
In the women’s event in phase one entries are split into 10 groups. The top four seeded players: Hana MATELOVA of Czech Republic Barbora BALAZOVA of Slovakia Yana NOSKOVA of Russia and SHAO Jieni of Portugal are not play in the groups but they are qualify directly for Stage 2. The winner and the runner up of each of the 10 groups will qualify for Stage 2 together with the 4 seeded players making a total of 24 players. After Stage 2 starting from the round of 32 both finalists will qualify for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games (the final match shall not be played).
The remaining 22 players from Stage 2 will continue into Stage 3 in a direct knock out draw of 32. The two finalists of the Stage 3 K.O. draw will qualify for Tokyo 2020 (the final match shall not be played).
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