Despite a very good first round, the last Frenchman competing at the Malaysian Open was eliminated this Friday by the world number 2 (21-15, 10-21, 13-21).
There will be no French in the semi-finals of the Malaysian Open, a Super 1000 tournament – the highest rank on the circuit. Last survivor, Alex Lanier suffered the law of the world number 2 – Kunlavut Vitidsarn – this Thursday in three sets (21-15, 10-21, 13-21). A defeat which is not infamous, obviously, for the 20-year-old badista, who started his year well and who would have liked to beat the Thai a third time in five confrontations. But after a first set which he dominated, the Caennais then came up against a real wall leaving him tactically helpless.
However, the meeting could not have started better for the Caennais, who immediately took resolute direction of operations (9-3). However, the world number 2 did not give up and he reduced the gap (12-10) to pose a threat to the domination exercised by the Frenchman. But he did not let himself join the score (15-12), before making a nice acceleration by gleaning three consecutive points (18-12). A crippling gap for the Thai, who made too many mistakes along the length to hope. And as a symbol, the first round ended with a smash into the net from the Asian player which allowed Lanier to end the round at his first opportunity (21-15).
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The inexorable rise of Vitidsarn
Unfortunately, the start of the next set didn’t tell exactly the same story. Suddenly much more solid in the exchange by reducing his errors to the strict minimum, Vitidsarn immediately broke away to reverse the trend (2-6). And even if Lanier immediately stopped the bleeding to return to level (6-6) but the improvement proved to be short-lived. Faced with an opponent who defended like hell, the Frenchman began to force too much in attack to find solutions and the Thai took advantage of this to move forward (10-14). Before closing the lid sharply on this second round by winning the last seven points against a Norman looking towards the final act of this quarter-final (10-21).
A final set which started well for the Frenchman (3-1). But a long rally of 47 racket strokes, then a failed easy smash placed him in the position of the hunter rather than the hunted with the score (3-5). And as in the previous round, Vitidsarn was formidable in defense, forcing the Caennais to take risks. Without these paying off since the Thai inflicted a terrible 10-0 on a Lanier showing more and more signs of frustration, and struck down by an opposing smash (5-15). And despite good resistance at the end, the Frenchman had to admit defeat after 1h20 of a beautiful, but vain, battle.
