By Neha Aggarwal
With this win, Shunsuke Togami took home the junior boys’ crown, having made his international debut in 2016 at the Slovak Junior and Cadet Open in June 2016. There, Togami lost in the quarter finals to Tobias Hippler of Germany in a very narrow margin, a full seven games duel, loosing 9-11 in the decider.
But in Orebro, he was a different man. In the finals, he started off very strong and took the initial lead of 2-0 against Menand. But Menand would never give up, he came back strong winning the next two games 2-11 and 10-12.
“My concentration was low for some moments. In the fifth set I got my concentration back and I just focused on next point,” said Shunsuke Togami
The Japanese whipped off the next two games 11-8, 11-4 despite having to work hard to win each and every point. An extremly thrilling finals came to an end Togami winning the match 4-2.
Earlier in the semi-finals, he beat Russia’s Denis Ivonin, ranked no.24 in Under-18 February global ranking. The match saw the score of 11-0 come to life as Togami crushed Ivonin 11-0 in the first game. He won in five games (11-0, 8-11, 11-5, 11-6, 14-12).
Surprisingly, the top two seeded players of the tournament were show the doors in the round of 16. Top seed USA’s Kanak Jha bowed out to Japan’s Aoto Asazu in a well fought six games match (9-11, 8-11, 9-11, 11-5,11-5, 6-11). On the other side, the second seed of the tournament Russia’s Vladimir Sidorenko was knocked down by the winner, Shunsuke Togami in a quick five games duel (11-4, 12-10, 11-8, 7-11,11-5).
More Information:
- Junior Boys Singles
- Junior Boys Doubles
- Junior Boys Consolation
- All matches- Day 1
- All matches Day 2
- Photo Gallery
