Yonex Scottish National Badminton Championships gets underway
Top class badminton returns to Bell’s Sports Centre this weekend as Scotland’s best players arrived in Perth to compete in the Yonex National Badminton Championships.
Action got underway this afternoon in men’s singles qualifying with four places up for grabs in the main draw.
Evan Kenny overcame a strong challenge from Danny O’Neil Ferrero to secure the first qualifying position, winning 15-21 21-9 21-10 to set up a first round match against Finlay Jack on Saturday morning.
He will be joined in the main draw by Jake Thomas, who beat namesake Sen 21-15 21-7 before Jiayi Lu beat Shaun Aamir 21-13 21-12 to claim the third qualifying position. Thomas’ reward is a tough first round against joint 5/8 seed James Robertson while Lu will play Grant Lewis.
The last qualifying spot was claimed by Theo Johnston, who beat Daniel Innes in arguably the best match of the afternoon 21-14 18-21 21-18.
Things won’t get any easier for Johnston in the main draw – his reward for navigating his way through qualifying is a first round tie against joint 5/8 seed Ciar Pringle.
In the mixed doubles top seeds Adam Hall and Julie MacPherson sailed through the opening rounds, beating Callum Crangle and Laura Muir 21-8 21-12 before also ending the hopes of Muir’s daughter Iona and her partner Matthew Waring in the last-16.
Hall and MacPherson will face Christopher Grimley and Eleanor O’Donnell in the quarter-finals. Grimley and O’Donnell beat brother-sister pairing of Calvin and Katrina Chan in their opening match and followed it up with a solid 21-18 21-10 win over Calum Flockhart and Brooke Stalker.
In the bottom half of the draw second seeds Alex Dunn and Ciara Torrance will face Jack MacGregor and Sarah Sidebottom in the semi-final. Dunn and Torrance beat Angus Meldrum and Abbie Brooks to book their place while MacGregor and Sidebottom knocked out Finlay Jack and Sophie Barrie.
The Yonex Scottish National Championships is being held at Bell’s Sports Centre from 4-6 February 2022.
Play starts on Saturday at 09.00hrs, with men’s and women’s singles and doubles being played up to and including the quarter finals.
On Sunday 6 February all semi-finals will be played from 10.00hrs, before the finals of all events start at 14.00hrs.
Results, draws and match schedules are at https://www.tournamentsoftware.com/sport/tournament?id=B19702AA-98C9-4B53-B2E0-39055D5AA5FF
There is no general admittance to spectators, but all matches are being live streamed at https://www.youtube.com/user/OfficialSBU