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By Chia Han Keong
THE semi-final stage proved to be the stumbling block again for Singapore's women table-tennis players. Both Feng Tianwei and Wang Yuegu crashed out in straight sets at the Volkswagen Women's World Cup semifinals
in Kuala Lumpur yesterday.
Feng lost 6-11, 11-13, 8-11, 7-11 to Hong Kong's Tie Yana, while Wang succumbed 11-13, 2-11, 7-11, 9-11 to China's Li Xiaoxia. At last month's Beijing Olympics, it was Li Jiawei who fell at the last four of the women's singles tournament to world No. 1 Zhang Yining.
In 2004, Li failed to advance past the semi-finals at the Athens Games. Nor did retired paddler Jing Junhong at the 2000 Sydney Games. Yesterday, hopes were high that at least one of the two paddlers would reach the final, especially after Feng beat top-seed Guo Yue in the quarter-finals.
However, the world No. 9 never found her form against her opponent, who is ranked a spot below her, and never led in her match. While she rallied to pull level late in the second and third games, Tie snatched all the important points to seal a convincing victory.
It was the same story for Wang, except that she was up against the world No. 3. While the Singaporean world No. 7 kept it close in the first game, she also failed to clinch the important points.
Still, it was a good showing for the Republic at the tournament, even though some of the top women players like Zhang gave it a miss. -- myp
This article first appeared in mypaper on Sep 9,2008.
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