Davis Cup Result

As predicted Taiwan loses 5-0 to India. Full results here

http://www.daviscup.com/en/draws-results/tie/details.aspx?tieId=100021112

Chen Ti did manage to give Somdev Devvarman, a guy ranked 180 places above him, a fight. Chen fell in the fifth set 9-7.

On more positive note, Jimmy Wang, Taiwan's number two player, is playing in the finals of the challenger in Chitre, Panama. He faces against Wayne Odesnik of the United States.

They played twice last year. Both time Jimmy won. The more notable win was in the first round of Wimbledon.

Go Jimmy! Duplicate this results!

Davis Cup vs. India

Taiwan takes on India this weekend in the first round of Group I play at Indore, India. As first round play is always around Chinese New Years, Taiwan doesn't have its A team for this round. Lu Yen-Hsun is taking time off at home in Taiwan for the holidays while Jimmy Wang is busy at a challenger in Panama. Instead, Yang Tsung-Hua, Chen Ti, Peng Hsien-Yen, and Lee Hsin-Han will represent the Taiwanese contingent.

India will be the overwhelming favorites with two top 200 single players (Somdev Devvarman and Yuki Bhambri) and a top 15 doubles player (Rohan Bopanna). There's a strong chance India will go 5-0 this weekend.

Taiwan avoided relegation last year by beating Indonesia.

I do feel like Taiwan should stay in Group I this year as on paper they're stronger than Korea and New Zealand.

Taiwan Team Tennis

School has been busy for me :(

Last week the Taiwanese tennis teams competed in their respective Asian Divisonal zones. It was a rough week as the only match that Taiwan won was the women against South Korea. The Taiwanese men's team lost 5-0 to Australia and will face China in April in the loser's bracket.

With their win against South Korea, the women were able to stave off relegation and will be in the first tier in Asia again in 2014.

Of course none of the major stars played, so the results were to be expected. And I don't blame them. It was the New Years weekend. I wouldn't want to go to Kazakhstan (women) during the biggest holiday of the year.

Anyways, Su-Wei is playing in Qatar. Battling through injury she beat Tatjana Malek of Germany 6-4 6-4.

My Viewings of the Australian Open

Here's what has happened:
Best thing-Chan Yung-Jan winning her first round match against Daniela Hantuchova. Weird three set match but a win is a win. With the first round points and the added points from qualifying, Chan should make the Top 100 again.

Probably the worst thing- Chang Kai-Chen losing her first round doubles match. It wasn't that she and Yan Zi lost-it was just how badly they lost against Dominika Cibulkova and Ksenia Pervak 0-6 3-6.

Matches I watched:

Chang vs. Stosur

Chang was close in the first set due to her return of serve catching Stosur in no man's land. She served for the set at 5-4 but couldn't capitalize. Stosur ran away with the second.

Chan vs. Ivanovic

Tight three set match here which Chan lost. Chan was won the second set thanks to Ivanovic who seemed to be hitting for the fences. To be honest, Chan wasn't doing much and I wasn't too impressed with Chan's play. Her serve was significantly slower than the last time I saw her, and she doesn't look exactly 'fit.' Once Ivanovic got a brain in the third set, Ivanovic started winning quite comfortably.

Lu vs. Monfils

So Lu did win his first round that I expected him to win. Unfortunately he would lose 6-8 in the fifth set to Monfils. Both players were spent and exhausted. Lu seemed to have the more endurance but Monfils had more weapons in his shot selection that carried him to the end.

Hsieh/Peng vs. Johansson/Parmentier

Hsieh and Peng won 6-2 6-4. Nothing too spectacular-Parmentier made so many errors that Hsieh and Peng only needed to play around average to take this in straights.

So later today Lu is playing with Go Saeda in the second round of men's doubles. Hsieh is the only Taiwanese player in the mixed draw.

Australian Open Preview

It's the Pacific Asia Grand Slam!!!!

So Taiwan has three women in the main draw: Hsieh Su-Wei, Chang Kai-Chen, and Chan Yung-Jan. Yung-Jan successfully made it out of qualifying. (Woot!) She had to win three matches and only lost ten games in the process. A huge Taiwanese contingent was there (probably over 500).

Hsieh plays Lara Arruabarrena-Vecino, who is playing in her first Australian Open. Chang plays Top 10 player Australian Samantha Stosur (solace is Stosur is dreadful playing in her home country and Chang beat her last year in Osaka). Chang got a horrible draw and is playing Daniela Hantuchova.

In doubles, Hsieh is playing with her friend Shuai Peng. Chang is playing with another Chinese-Yan Zi coming back from maternity leave. And of course, Yung-Jan will be playing with her sister. Draws will be announced later. Unfortunately top 50 ranked Chuang Chia-Jung is out with injury and can't play.

In men's singles, Lu Yen-Hsun plays Ruben Ramirez Hidalgo of Spain. Hidalgo is ranked about 30 places below Lu and has never won a match here. (So please please win your match Rendy....)

In qualifying, Taiwan had three men: Jimmy Wang lost first round while Ti Chen and Yang Tsung-Hua lost in the second round.

That's it for now. It'd be great to see if the same people who watched Chan Yung-Jan come out and watch more of the Australian Open!

More from the Chan Sisters

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeSqzYEym3s

Here are some comments the Chan sisters gave to the media. Basically they said they needed to focus more but that this was a great start to the season.

Yung-Chan speaks first and younger sis Hao-Ching speaks second in the video.

Chan Sisters take Shenzhen Open

Congrats to Hao-Ching and Yung-Jan for capturing the Shenzhen Open! The first seeds stayed true to form, and this is the first title for the duo together. They beat Irina Buryachok of Ukraine and Valeria Solovieva 6-0 7-5. They started the week off blitzing Alexandra Candatu and Anne Keothavong 6-0 6-1. In the quarters they had to survive a super tiebreaker and a tiebreaker in the semis. Congrats!

On another note, Su-Wei lost her second match and had to pull out of doubles with her sister. WTA states that she had a right forearm injury. But on facebook, Su-Wei calmed her fans saying that it was just a 24 hour thing. She's signed up for Hobart this week, so hoepfully this is just a minor scare. She plays her good friend Shuai Peng in the first round and is not signed up for doubles.

Hao-Ching wil play Syndey this week in doubles with Alicja Rosolska of Poland. Yung-Jan is probably going to be in Melbourne preparing for the Australian Open qualifying.

Good luck!

10 things I want to see in 2013

Some are more realistic than others

1.       Tennis player Hsieh Su-Wei to maintain her ranking in the top 30

2.       Fourth of the medals table at East Asian Games

3.       Figure skater qualify past the first round at the World Championships

4.       Luger Lien Te-An successfully qualify for the 2014 Olympics

5.       Jeremy Lin leads Rockets to the playoffs

6.       Golfer Yani Tseng to hold on to her number 1 ranking

7.       Advance out of pool play at the World Baseball Classic

8.       Top 6 finish for both national basketball teams at the FIBA Asia Championships

9.       Footballer Victor Chou to recover from his foot surgery

10.   Jimmy Wang to break back into top 100 of the ATP rankings

What would you like to see of Taiwanese athletes this year?

2013 tennis season underway

So it's not 2013 yet but the WTA and the ATP have already started their year off.

The Taiwanese women contingent will be playing in Shenzhen this week. Already Hsieh Su-Wei has won her first against the lefty Melinda Czink. She would go on to play doubles with her sister Hsieh Shu-Ying in the last match of the night. They would beat the fourth seed pair of Mandy Minella and Timea Babos in two tiebreakers. Congrats on the good start girls!

Other Taiwanese players in Shenzhen are Chan Hao-Ching and Chan Yung-Jan who are seeded first in doubles. Yung-Jan will also play in singles against Ayumi Morita in the first round. Chang Kai-Chen will also be doing singles and doubles. In singles she's facing Silvia Soler-Espinosa and in doubles she's playing with (the recently returned from maternity leave) Yan Zi.

As for the men, Yan Tsung-Hua and Lu Yen-Hsun are in Chennai. Tsung-Hua has already lost in qualifying (boo). Yen-Hsun is seeded seventh and will play Matthias Bachinger of Germany in the first round.

Taiwanese Tennis Year in Review (Male)

Argh....I did the female verson a month ago, but didn't have time for the male version until the holidays. Without further ado......

 

Lu Yen-Hsun

Photo Credit: Lia Organization

2011 Year end rank: 82

2012 Current rank: 59
Doubles Rank: 144

Yen-Hsun (aka Rendy) found much success this year on the ATP Challenger circuit. On the ATP main tour, he lost in the first round at three of the four majors. At two of the ATP World Tour tournaments, he was able to get major points thanks to drawing a wild card in Shanghai and a retirement in Beijing. His ranking improved 23 places thanks to winning three challenger tournaments: Seoul, Shanghai, and Singapore. He also won a doubles title at Bangkok with his good friend Udomchoke. He had two top ten wins against David Ferrer (though this was a retirement) and Janko Tipsarevic. He will kick off his 2013 season next week at Chennai. Hopefully he'll find more success on the main tour and won's have to go down to lower tournaments.

Jimmy Wang

Photo Credit: European Pressphoto Agency

2011 Year end rank: 156

2012 Current rank: 274
Doubles Rank: 264

Jimmy (formerly Yeu-tzuoo on the ATP website) is making small steps to get back into the top 100 ever since wrist problems sidelined him in 2010. He did solidly on the challenger circuit reaching the semis three times, but the best tournament was arguably at the US Open where he qualified for the main draw and beat Ivo Karlovic, his only top 100 win of the year. This was his first main draw Grand Slam win since 2007 Wimbledon. In all he earned $128,000 in prize money. With an improvement of 100 places this year, we hope to see a continual rise as Jimmy fights his way back to the tour.

Lee Hsin-Han

Photo Credit: Getty Images
Doubles Rank: 95
Note: Finally broke top 100 after about six years on tour.

Hsieh Cheng-Peng

Photo Credit: Tennis HK

 

Doubles Rank: 162
Note: Su-wei's (Taiwan's top female player) younger brother.

Peng Hsien-Yin

Doubles Rank: 172

Note: Started the year with a doubles ranking in the 1000s.

Hsin-Han won Qarshi and Seoul Challenger tournaments with Hsien-Yin and Prostějov Challenger with Cheng-Peng. Time will tell if these three can be fixtures in the doubles scene.

 Missing in action: Yang Tsung-Hua

Not really MIA. But what happened? Turn things around please in 2013!!!

Pronounciation lesson 101

Here's a link on how to pronounce Hsieh Su-Wei, highest ranked tennis player in Taiwan, by TennisNowTV.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6tq3-2QQfm8

Nice try. But the second word isn't pronounced like 'sue' and the third word needs to be a little bit higher in pitch.

Taiwanese tennis year in review (female)

Hsieh Su-Wei

 

2011 Year end rank: 172

2012 Current rank: 25

Doubles Rank: 25

What a year for Su-Wei! She won 2 WTA title and 3 ITF singles title. Along with that she won a doubles title each on the two circuits. She reached a career high ranking and is now the highest ranked Taiwanese player in history. Her original goal for the year was to qualify for the Olympics, and she did that raising her ranking more than a 100 places to achieve it. There is a lot more I want to say that I'll be writing another post of Su-Wei in the future.

Chang Kai-Chen (right)

 

2011 Year end rank: 142

2012 Current rank: 89

Doubles Rank: 78

Kai-Chen (affectionately known as KFC) had her best year end ranking thanks in part to a 28-26. She did better in doubles with a 19-8 record. She had disastrous results during the European clay and grass and the US hard court. At one point she was 5-16 during a six month period. She turned it around once the Asian circuit came. She reached the finals of 220K Osaka (losing in a thriller) and 125K Taipei. In addition, she won doubles titles at Kuala Lumpur, Washington DC, and ITF Ningbo.

Chan Yung-Jan

 

2011 Year end rank: 132

2012 Current rank: 103

Doubles Rank: 73

Yung-Jan had an up and down year with a record of 20-14 in singles and a 11-12 record in doubles. She only played 14 tournaments this year because of a surgery for the removal of a cyst sidelining her for the first part of the year. She also suffered dizziness at Guangzhou, ending her season prematurely in September. Her best results came from reaching the semifinal of Carlsbad and the final of ITF Beijing.  These helped her rise 29 places in the rankings. Here's hoping that next year she can maintain a full schedule and rise up in the ranks!

Chuang Chia-Jung (left)

 

Doubles Rank: 39

Chia-Jung won two WTA tour (Kuala Lumpur and Estoril) doubles titles this year, meaning she now has a total of 19 doubles title in her career. She raised her ranking up eight places and won $90,000 in prize money. She also qualified for the Olympics and at 27, she is now a well established doubles veteran on the tour.

Chan Hao-Ching (far left)

Doubles Rank: 50

Yung-Jan's younger sister rose about 60 places in the doubles rankings. She won ITF Quanzhou and WTA Taipei leading to a 24-18 record. She has also played with her sister at several events with the best result being the round of 16 at Roland Garros and a final at Pattaya City. Proving she belonged on the tour, she scored wins over double specialists Grandin, Uhilirova, Mattek-Sands, Mirza, Lee-Waters, and Moulton-Levy. She's only 19 and the future looks bright for her.

 

Honorable Mention:

Chan Chin-Wei-Singles winner at ITF Incheon and Doubles winner at ITF Taipei 2

Hsieh Shu-Ying (Su-Wei's younger sister)-Doubles winner at ITF Wenshan and ITF Karuizawa