Paris: World No. 1 men’s pair – Marcus Fernaldi Gideon/Kevin Sanjaya Sukamuljo of Indonesia, defending their second French Open title as a pair, are one game away to end their 650 days title drought in an individual event. Even though the Indonesian team just won the prestigious Thomas Cup on Oct 17, 2021, but Gideon/Sukamuljo’s last individual title was at the 2020 Indonesia Masters, beating compatriots Mohammad Ahsan/Hendra Setiawan in the final 21–15, 21–16 on January 19, 2020.
On Saturday, the World No. 1 a.k.a “Minions” survived a huge French Open scare, saving six match points to beat compatriots and World No. 7 Fajar Alfian/Muhammad Rian Ardianto 21-19, 12-21, 26-24.
“We are lucky to win today because Fajar/Rian were playing very well,” said Gideon.
“When we were behind, we tried to stay calm and enjoy the game. The European tour was long and tiring, so, we just enjoyed the game,” added Gideon.
The Indonesians will meet Korea’s 2014 World Champions – Ko Sung Hyun/Shin Baekcheol in the final.
Ko/Shin were caught in a tug of war semi-final match against Malaysia’s World No. 8 Aaron Chia/Soh Wooi Yik, saving 3 match-points to move past the Malaysian pair 14-21, 21-10, 24-22 in 56 minutes.
In men’s singles, after winning the first game 26-24, World No. 1 Kento Momota of Japan had to retire before the start of the third set against compatriot Kanta Tsuneyama after he pulled his back muscle early second game. He was originally planning to retire in the second game, but changed his mind and decided to finish the game anyway and ended up losing 11-21. After talking to his coach before the start of the decider, he chose to pull out of the tournament. Despite Momota’s withdrawal being due to a real injury he sustained during the match, however, according to BWF’s rules and regulation, Momota would lose all ranking points accumulated for the whole 2021 French Open tournament because he withdrew when playing against his teammate.
Regulation 4.4 of BWF’s World Ranking System stated that:
In the World Championships, Grade 2 – Levels 2-4 tournaments, and Continental Confederation Individual Championships/Continental Multi Sports Games Individual Championships, if a Player / pair withdraws or retires from a match played against a Player / pair from the same Member they will not receive World Ranking points for that tournament.
Tsuneyama will face Taiwan’s Chou Tien Chen in the final.
After surviving grueling semi-finals, Akane Yamaguchi will set up an all-Japanese women’s singles final against Sayaka Takahashi on Sunday.
Meanwhile, Korea’s women’s doubles No. 1 seeds Lee Sohee/Shin Seungchan will face No. 2 seeds Kim Soyeong/Kong Heeyong in the final. This will be the second meeting between the two pairs in two weeks when Lee/Shin beat Kim/Kong in the semi-finals of the Denmark Open last Saturday.
Japan’s Yuta Watanabe/Arisa Higashino may earn a chance to win their second title in two weeks when they face Denmark’s Mathias Christiansen/Alexandra Bøje in the mixed doubles final on Sunday. Watanabe/Higashino defeated Thailand’s Dechapol Puavaranukroh/Sapsiree Taerattanachai 21-18, 21-9 in last week’s Denmark Open final.
