All eyes were on centre court this afternoon on the third day of competition at The BMW Malaysian Open 2015 as sixth seed Kurumi Nara of Japan took on World No 101 Stefanie Voegele of Switzerland.
Both Nara and Voegele are part of a new breed of young and upcoming players from around the globe who came to Kuala Lumpur to take part in Malaysiaâs premier womenâs tennis tournament and pit their tennis skills against one another to advance further into the tournament. Â
World No 57 Nara started strongly in the first set as she dominated play over her Swiss opponent to take the first set 6-3. In the second set however, Nara had to work extra hard as a determined and resurgent Voegele refused to be overrun as she took the fight to Nara. After a grueling 1 hour and 47 minutes on court, Nara managed to stave off Voegeleâs challenge, narrowly taking the second set 7-6 to win the match.
âVoegele played really well today, especially in the second set as she put up a really tough fight and refused to let up. But I managed to subdue her with some good serves and some really positive thinking of winning the match which helped me prevail,â said a relieved Nara.
She continued by saying, âI am very happy to be here in Malaysia to take part in the BMW Malaysian Open, which is a tournament that Iâve been looking forward to. Iâve played a couple of matches already over the past two days of competition and the matches have been quite tough, so this is proving to be quite a challenging tournament which is very good for us players. My aim this year is to break into the top 50 players ranking and perhaps win another tournament.â
Nara will face either World No 117 Magda Linette of Poland or World No 88 Wang Qiang of China in the last 16.
In other matches, there was doubles action on court 1 as the Chinese pair of Zhu Lin and Yang Zhaoxuan managed to overcome the pair of Japanese Mia Eguchi and Sofia Shapatava of Georgia 6-1, 3-6, 10-6. They will face either Chang Kai-Chen and ZhengSaiSai or Xu Yi-Fan and Zhang Kai-Lin in the next round.
On court 2, Croatian DarijaJurak and her partner KlaraKoukalova of the Czech Republic defeated the pair of Belgian An-Sophie Mestach and Briton Emily Webley-Smith 4-6, 6-3, 10-1 to advance to the next round, where they will face either the pairing of Naomi Broady and Carina Witthoeft or Tatiana Bua and Patricia Mayr-Achleitner.
In the east versus west doubles match, the Ukrainian pair of YuliyaBeygelzimer and Olga Savchuk emerged victorious as they took slightly more than an hour to defeat the Thai pair of PeangtarnPlipuech and VarunyaWongteanchai in three sets, 4-6, 6-0, 10-4.
The main draw matches for both singles and doubles disciplines will continue tomorrow, as singles players march on the final 16 of the tournament. Stay tuned for all the tennis action happening right here at the BMW Malaysian Open 2015. Â Â
Admission is free for the BMW Malaysian Open from the start of the qualifying rounds on February 28th, 2015 until March 4, 2015.
Tickets are priced between RM33-RM73 from March 6th to 8th, 2015 respectively.
For more ticketing information, visit www.ticketcharge.com.my or call +603-92228811.
For more information visit the tournament Facebook page at www.facebook.com/BMWMalaysianOpen
