Last of RP tandems fall to seeded foes

Pablo Olivarez and Miguel Narvaez failed to make a follow-up to their big first round victory as they bowed to the seventh seeded tandem of Myles Blake of Great Britain and Samuel Groth of Australia, 6-4, 6-0, yesterday in the 16th Mitsubishi Lancer ITF Juniors tournament at the Rizal Memorial Coliseum.

A day after stunning world No. 503 Marcel Goodman of the United States and Gregory Gumbs of France, 3-6, 6-0, 6-1, Olivarez and Narvaez rammed into the talented Blake-Groth duo and lost in just a little more than an hour.

Earlier, the pair of Kyle Joshua Dandan and Ralph Barte was booted out by third pick Martin Sayer and Lai Xiao Peng of Hong Kong, 3-6, 3-6, wiping out the Filipino campaigners.

In men’s singles, Samuel Groth of Australia and Chris Eaton of Great Britain continued their giant-killing spree with the former booting out 10th seed Christoph Hodl of Austria, 6-3, 6-4, and the latter bundling out 11th ranked Lai Xiao-Peng of Hong Kong, 6-3, 6-3.

Those victories set Groth against top seed Vivek Shokeen of India and Eaton versus Japanese Shuhei Uzawa in the quarterfinal round. Shokeen beat Jiri Kosler of Czech Republic, 6-4, 1-6, 6-1, while Uzawa prevailed over Charl Womarans of South Africa, 7-5, 6-3.

The US tandem of Dennis Lajola, born in the Philippines but grew up in Hawaii, and Johnny Hamui barged into the quarterfinals by shocking No. 6 Weerapat Doakmailee and Kirati Siributwong of Thailand, 6-1, 7-6 (6). They will face Lee Hsin Han of Chinese-Taipei and Christopher Llewellyn of Great Britain, who advanced with a walkover win over second seed Abdullah Magdas of Kuwait and Thomas Habsuda of Australia.

Top seed Vivek Shokeen and Sanam Singh needed an extra set to thwart Edward Corrie and Chris Eaton of Great Britain, 6-4, 6-7 (5), 6-3, and set up a quarterfinal duel with Blake and Groth.

Others who advanced were quarterfinal rivals Tristan Farron-Mahon of Ireland and Jiri Kosler of the Czech Republic and No. 5 Kristofer Wachter and Andreas Haider-Maurer of Austria.

Farron-Mahon and Kosler edged Lien Chia-Chu and Chang Huai-En of Chinese Taipei, 3-6, 6-4, 6-3, while Wachter and Haider-Maurer bashed Ruben Bemelmans and Michel Antheunis of Belgium, 6-4, 6-0.