Jakarta: Kento Momota of Japan was a formidable World No. 1 men’s singles player and was a player who terrorized his opponents with his mental strength and physical stamina before surviving the fatal car crash on Jan 13, 2020.
However, after recovering from the car accident, he’s no longer as dominant as he used to be, and lost his fourth first-round battle out of his fifth individual tournament this year on Wednesday when World No. 13 Rasmus Gemke of Denmark beat the Japanese 21-19, 19-21, 21-14 in 82 minutes.
Momota who is currently ranked World No. 2, has not been doing well this season. He was eliminated in the first round of the German Open, Asian Championship, and Thailand Open. He lost to Lee Zii Jia of Malaysia in the quarter-final of the 2022 All England.
He also lost to Lee Zii Jia and Anthony Sinisuka Ginting of Indonesia in the Thomas Cup Finals.
“I made a lot of errors today, I am very disappointed,” said Momota.
“I’ll train harder and get ready for my next tournament,” added Momota.
Momota has a chance to redeem himself at the Malaysia Open that will be held in Kuala Lumpur, from June 28, 2022, to July 3, 2022, and he will open against Thailand’s World No. 22 Kantaphon Wangcharoen.
In men’s doubles, Malaysia’s NO. 5 seeds Aaron Chia/Soh Wooi Yik produced a thrilling riposte to Kim Gi Jung/Kim Sa Rang’s gallant attempt to knock them out of the Indonesia Open by beating the Korean pair 21-18, 11-21, 21-11 in the first round of Indonesia Open.
Chia/Soh will take on Ruben Jille/Ties Van Der Lecq of the Netherlands in the second round.
Despite leading at 20-18 in the second game, Indonesia’s men’s doubles No. 2 seeds Mohammad Ahsan/Hendra Setiawan couldn’t force a decider after China’s new “Twin Towers” Liu Yu Chen/Ou Xuan Yi outlasted “the Daddies” 21-17, 24-22 in 43 minutes.
Liu/Ou will face off against M.R. Arjun/Dhruv Kapila of India on Thursday.
