Jakarta –
PBSI Kabidbinpres Rionny Mainaky hope Gregoria Mariska Tunjung can create a surprise in World Championship 2023. This cannot be separated from the performance of Indonesia’s leading women’s singles athletes who are starting to experience improvement.
Indonesia is known to have fielded 15 representatives with one of them occupied by Gregoria. Of that amount, PBSI has set a target of two titles to win from the Grade 1 individual tournament which will be held in Copenhagen, Denmark, 21-27 July. Namely from men’s doubles and men’s singles.
Even though there was no women’s singles, Rionny Mainaky had special hopes for Gregoria at the annual event. Unmitigated, she wants the world’s 8th ranked women’s singles to win the title, like during the 2017 World Championships at the junior level.
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“I want him to win the world championship, because he was a junior (2017 world champion). His condition is also good. Maybe seeing comments like this will add more enthusiasm, don’t be a burden,” Rionny told reporters when met at the PBSI Cipayung National Training Center.
Based on the performance notes quoted from the BWF rankings, Gregorian able to achieve fairly good results throughout the middle of this year. He won the Spain Masters, was a finalist at the Malaysia Masters, and was a semifinalist at the Swiss Open and Japan Open 2023. Even at the All England Super 1000 tournament, he made it to the quarterfinals.
Not only that, he has also successfully defeated a number of top badminton names, such as Akane Yamaguchi, Pusarla V Sindhu, Wang Zhi Yi, He Bing Jiao, to Carolina Marin.
So, in this World Championship, Gregoria, who is the eighth seed, received a bye in the first round. In the next phase, he is waiting for the winner from Qi Xuefei Vs Yeo Jia Min. If everything goes well, he will face his first challenge against Han Yue, the ninth seed from China. Even then, with the record, Yue was also smooth until the third round.
In the quarterfinals, Gregoria had the chance to meet Busanan Ongbamrungphan (Thailand) or Akane Yamaguchi (Japan).
“The drawing results are decent in one group (chart), there is one China (Han Yue). So, he has to be a little careful when he meets a tenacious player. If he’s like He Bing Jiao, he’s the same as Akane, if Grego plays net, he’s good. I am confident of winning, even though they are at a higher level,” said Rionny.
“That’s what we have to anticipate Gregorian it’s tenacious players like An Se You or Tai Tzu Ying. An Se plays neatly and tenaciously but only hits occasionally, Tzu Ying has strange variations of punches,” he said.
(mcy/cas)
2023-08-15 08:10:03
#Waiting #Surprise #Gregoria #Mariska #World #Championship
