Sport - Badminton   

Xingfang stuns Martin

SINGAPORE Aug. 23. The top seed Camilla Martin, who had expressed uncertainty about facing Chinese players in the Singapore Open badminton tournament, had her fears realised in the second round on Thursday as she was dumped out by Xie Xingfang.

The Danish star was beaten by the first Chinese player she faced in the $170,000 tournament with Xie charging to an 11-7, 13-10 win to book a quarterfinal berth.

Xie, who was on a roll after defeating Singapore's recently crowned Commonwealth Games champion Li Li in the first round, said she outsmarted Martin in the second round. ``When playing in Asia, the Europeans try to save their stamina and never play all out. I took advantage of that and made her work hard on every point,'' a beaming Xie said.

``It was a very close match. I won the first game after a great fight and she could have won the second but suddenly became too defensive.''

The women's number two seed, Zhou Mi of China, looked to be following Martin with an early exit after losing the first game 7-11 against Thailand's Sujitra Ekmongkolpaisarn before bouncing back to take the next two games 11-2, 11-2.

The match was more evenly contested than the scoreline would indicate, with the Thai giving no respect to the star status of her opponent and producing some audacious smashes that had even the Chinese contingent putting their hands together in appreciation.

But, in the end Zhou packed too much power for her less experienced opponent.

In the men's singles third round, Singaporean hero Ronald Susilo ended the dream run of Pullela Gopichand of India, winning 15-8, 15-12. The Indian number one seemed to wilt under the loud support that Susilo mustered from the smattering of fans who turned out to watch the shuttlers in action.

The results: Men: Ronald Susilo bt Pullela Gopichand 15-8, 15-12; Xia Xuanze bt Muhammad Roslin Hashim 15-11, 6-15, 15-8.

Women: Xie Xingfang bt Camilla Martin 11-7, 13-10; Zhou Mi bt Sujitra Ekmongkolpaisarn 7-11, 11-2, 11-2.

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