Badminton Open: Pinoys win mixed doubles game

Matches on Thursday Philsports Arena, Pasig 8:30 a.m. – Men's Singles (2nd Round) 2 p.m. – Mixed Doubles (Last 32) 3:30 p.m. – Women's Singles (Last 32) 5 p.m. – Men's Singles (3rd Round) 6:30 p.m. – Women's Doubles (Last 32) 8 p.m. – Men's Doubles (Last 32) Siblings Kennevic and Kennie Asuncion easily defeated Portugal's Filipa Lamy and Alexandre Paixao, 21-13, 21-17, on Wednesday at the start of the Bingo Bonanza Philippine Badminton Open 2007 at the Philsports Arena in Pasig. The mixed doubles victory made up for the defeat of Kennevic in the men's singles event to unseeded Malaysian Yogendran Krishnan, 17-21, 14-21. Three straight games in the eliminations took its toll on Kennevic. He defeated Korean Wan Ho Park, 21-18, 25-27, 21-19; and dominated compatriots Ronel Estanislao, 21-8, 21-11; and Wilmer Frias, 21-3, 21-7, in the elims before succumbing to Krishnan. The brother-sister team will meet the victor in the other mixed doubles match between Taiwanese Yu Chin Chien-Yu Hsin Hsieh of and fourth-seeded German pair Katrin Piotrowski and Ingo Kindervater. India's Saina Nehwal, the defending singles champion, was the biggest casualty of the day, bowing to China's Zhu Jingjing, 21-15, 21-13. Early sparks In the morning matches, Malaysian qualifier Kwong Beng Chan also shocked No. 12 seed Yen Hui Kendrick Lee of Singapore. Chan provided the early sparks in the tournament as he surprised the fancied Lee, 22-20, 21-15, to barge into the Last 32 of the event sanctioned by the International Badminton Federation. It was Kwong's fourth straight win in just two days after posting three victories over Filipino Roden Rivera, Hoang Hai Nguyen of Vietnam, and Huy Giang Nguyen of Vietnam in Tuesday's qualifiers. Men's leaders Top-seeded Chen Hong and Olympic champion Taufik Hidayat downed their respective rivals in varying fashions to lead the march of the favorites in the men's division. Chen, the Chinese world No. 2, went through some anxious moments before subduing Ajay Jayaram of India, 21-19, 21-17. Hidayat, ranked 10th in the world and seeded fifth here, hardly worked out a sweat in disposing of Iranian Kaveh Mehrabi, 21-13, 21-12, in 23 minutes to barge into the second round of the centerpiece event. Chen, all geared up for this event following his title romp in the Thailand Open two weeks ago, faces another Indian Anand, Pawar. Hidayat, a semi-finalist in the Djarum Indonesia Super Series, takes on Vietnamese Tien Minh Nguyen in Thursday's last-32 matches, which start at 8:30 a.m. Pawar made short work of Juergen Koch of Austria, 21-8, 21-13, while Tien trounced Bjoem Joppien of Germany, 21-10, 21-14. On to 2nd round Second seed and world No. 3 Lee Chong Wei of Malaysia, Chinese world No. 5 Chunlai Bao, Japanese Shoji Sato and defending champion Hafiz Hashim of Malaysia all made it safely into the second round of the event, which drew a banner field of 31 countries involving more than 300 players. Lee, eyeing no less than a crack at the crown, whipped Taiwanese Sheng Shiun Liao, 21-15, 21-12; Bao outplayed Indonesian Andreas Adityawarman, 21-14, 21-12; and Sato bundled out Canadian Bobby Milroy, 21-19, 8-5 (Ret.). No. 8 Hashim, who outplayed brother Roslin to win the event last year, beat Luka Petric of Slovenia, 21-9, 21-14, to move on to the next phase – along with No. 4 Kenneth Jonassen of Denmark, No. 14 Kay Bin Yeoh of Malaysia, No. 9 Sung Hwan Park of Korea, and No. 13 Tsuen Seng Lee of Malaysia. Jonassen smashed Alexandre Paixao of Portugal , 21-10, 21-8; Yeoh blasted Chetan Anand of India , 21-10, 21-15; Sung downed Klaus Raffeiner of Italy , 21-8, 21-7; and Lee smothered Petr Koukal of the Czech Republic , 21-18, 21-10. - GMANews.TV