November 13, 2022
Johnnie Torjussen was among the pick of the performers for England at the FZ Forza Norwegian International as he made the round of 16 in the men’s singles.
There were also last 16 exits for men’s doubles pairs Alex Green and Brandon Yap and Rory Easton and Zach Russ.
Torjussen got past Norway’s Markus Barth 21-8, 21-9 in the round of 32 to set up a battle with Japan’s Minoru Koga at the next stage.
Koga emerged victorious 21-12, 21-17 in a hard-fought contest to see Torjussen exit before the quarter-finals.
Elsewhere in the men’s singles, there were round of 32 exits for Heng Lin Ngan and Nadeem Dalvi.
Ngan and Dalvi both battled through qualification on Thursday to book their place in the last 32 on Friday, but both then saw their competitions come to an end with their first match.
Ngan went down 21-17, 21-11 to Chinese Taipei’s Chia Hao Lee, while Dalvi was narrowly defeated 21-19, 21-19 by Japan’s Yushi Tanaka.
There were defeats in qualification for Adarsh Palani Kumar, who was beaten 21-15, 21-10 by Swede Filip Karlborg, and Michael Pang who exited to Danila Gataullin 21-16, 16-21, 21-19.
The men’s doubles saw Green and Yap beat German pair Jonathan Dresp and Kenneth Neumann 21-12, 21-15 to set up a tie with Ayato Endo and Yuta Takei, with the Japanese pair eventually proving too strong to win out 21-13, 21-18.
Eaton and Russ received a bye to the round of 16 where they met Shuntaro Mezaki and Haruya Nishida, with the Japanese pair emerging victorious 21-18, 21-15.
In the women’s singles, Ashwati Nair lost a thrilling battle with Latvia’s Jekaterina Romanova to exit at the round of 32 stage.
Romanova took the first set 21-12 before Nair bounced back to level the match, taking the second set 21-15. But the Latvian took a hard-fought decider 21-18 to advance to the last 16.
