by Ian Marshall, ITTF Publications Manager

In the later stages, the no.5 seed, he accounted for the Czech Republic’s Jiri Martinko, the no.13 seed (13-11, 11-7, 11-3), prior to recording a quarter-final success in opposition to Frenchman Rémi Menand, a player who had been required to compete in the qualification stage and was very much in form. In the second round of proceedings he had beaten Korea’s Lim Jinghoon, the top seed (13-11, 7-11, 11-4, 11-8).

A penultimate round place for Marek Badowski, somewhat contrary to expectations, it was the same for Japan’s Koyo Kanamitsu; for Aliaksandr Khanin of Belarus and Austria’s Andreas Levenko, their semi-final berth was no surprise. They started play as the respective second and third seeds, they were expected to progress.

Koyo Kanamitsu commenced matters as the no.9 seed, notably beating Italian qualifier Chen Shuainan (11-5, 11-9, 11-2, 12-10) and colleague Masaki Takami, the no.4 seed (11-6, 11-3, 11-6) to reserve his place in the last four.

Notably, in the later rounds, Andreas Levenko beat qualifiers, Poland’s Samuel Kulczycki (11-8, 11-7, 5-11, 11-5) and Slovakia’s Tibor Spanik (9-11, 11-5, 9-11, 11-3, 11-6) to reserve his last four place. Meanwhile, seeded Japanese players were the opponents for Aliaksandr Khanin. He overcame Yukiya Uda, the no.12 seed, by the very narrowest of decisions (8-11, 14-12, 12-10, 12-14, 15-13) before defeating Shunsuke Togami, the no.9 seed in a rather less dramatic fashion (11-9, 11-7, 11-8).

At the semi-final stage Marek Badowski meets Aliaksandr Khanin, Koyo Kanamitsu faces Andreas Levenko.

The Under 21 Men’s Singes event will be played to a conclusion on Friday 16th March.