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Atlanta, GA • March 17-22, 2003
By Larry Hodges
These were two of the wildest matches seen. Both were tightly contested, went the full distance, and in both cases, the eventual winner was down match point in the sixth game multiple times, and came back to win the seventh rather easily. The two winners advance to the Final Twelve. Due to the withdrawal of Razvan Cretu, there is a third opening in the Final Twelve, and the two losing semifinalists will have a playoff match (2:00 PM Tuesday) to decide the final player to advance to the Final Twelve.
Books could be written about a match like this, or the other semifinal. Both played straight topspin games, with O'Neill mostly looping forehand, blocking backhands, while Shodhan was more of a two-winged attacker. Shodhan's backhand, especially his punch-block, combined with loops from both sides, were his strength. O'Neill's strength was finding ways to set up his forehand loop, his "bread & butter" shot. Both players favored backhand serves, and both seemed to serve long too often. One interesting tactic was O'Neill's use of a backhand sidespin block to deaden the ball and change the pace.
A quick game-by-game rundown:
| Game One: | From 7-7, Shodhan runs it out, 11-7 |
| Game Two: | From 6-6, O'Neill goes up 9-6 and 10-8, and serve & rips a forehand to win 11-9. |
| Game Three: | Sean leads 8-5, but Shodhan scores 5 in a row to get two game points, 10-8. O'Neill scores the next three and he has a game point, 11-10. But Shodhan scores the next three to win 13-11. |
| Game Four: | This was the wild one. Shodhan leads 10-9, but does a slightly high drop shot that O'Neill kills, 10-all. At this point the match on the next table, between De Tran and Jiachen "David" Wang, begins. That match would go to 10-8 (match point for Wang! - but he wouldn't win it) before this game would end, with O'Neill finally winning 18-16! Along the way, both Shodhan and O'Neill have four game points each, with O'Neill finally converting at 17-16. |
| Game Five: | It's almost stereotypical that after losing a game like game four, Shodhan would have a letup - and he fell behind 7-2 and lost 11-7. |
| Game Six: | O'Neill almost has it won - he's up 3-2 in games, and goes up 6-1, completely dominating. Shodhan then took one of the most effective timeouts ever called. He and his coach, Dennis Davis, decided that he simply had to play every point with one intent, to get the first loop on. So after the break, he looped all deep balls, but also dropped most pushes back short to try to force a return he could loop. The strategy worked, as he pulled to 6-5, 7-all, 8-all. But O'Neill scores the next two, and has two match points at 10-8. Shodhan wins two points, ending each with a winning backhand. O'Neill gets another match point at 11-10, but again can't convert when Shodhan smashes, and O'Neill just misses a counter-smash. Shodhan goes up 12-11, then 13-12, and wins a nice rally by looping over and over until O'Neill misses - 14-12. The match is now even at 3-3, but O'Neill has had game points in two of the games he's lost - and three match points. |
| Game Seven: | The last game was almost anticlimactic, as Shodhan is looping everything, including O'Neill's slightly-too-long backhand serve. Shodhan goes up 5-2, then O'Neill takes a series of shots - but misses. Shodhan wins, 11-4, to advance to the Final Twelve. |
These two were possibly the most athletic players in the Qualifier, and the points were were spectacular counterlooping points. At various times, it looked like Wang was about to take it - and he had two match points in the sixth game against the lefty Dr. De Tran.
A quick game-by-game rundown:
| Game One | It's all Wang, as he leads 6-0 in winning 11-5. |
| Game Two | De has his chances. He leads 9-7, but is faulted on his serve for tossing it too low, but doesn't complain, just smiles. De goes up 10-8 game point - but Wang, looping spectacularly, wins the next four (including one unreturnable edge) to win 12-10, and go up 2-0 in games. |
| Game Three | This time De goes up 10-5 game point - and again can't hold it as Wang scores five in a row. However, De pulls it out in deuce, 12-10. |
| Game Four | At 5-5, Wang scores three in a row, and holds the 3-point lead the rest of the way to win 11-8, and go up 3-1 in games. |
| Game Five | De runs it out from 7-6, scoring the last four to win 11-6. |
| Game Six | This game began after the score reached 10-10 on the next table (O'Neill vs. Shodhan). Wang would go up match point 10-8 before the O'Neill-Shodhan match finishes, with O'Neill winning 18-16. Meanwhile, De is not watching the adjacent match, and he deuces it, and wins with a pair of nice backhand winners, 12-10 - and the match is all tied up at 3-3. |
| Game Seven | From 6-6, it's all De, winning the last five in a row. So De Tran advances to the Final Twelve, and Wang will have a playoff with Sean O'Neill to decide the final spot. |
This was another great match of acrobatic players. O'Neill isn't as fast as he was when he was training full time, but he can still move around, and Wang is probably the fastest player in the Trials. Wang's ability to counterloop against almost anything was almost scary. Few can match O'Neill in power when he gets hold of one, but Wang sometimes was able to counterloop or block them back.
A quick game-by-game rundown:
| Game One | O'Neill wins easily, 11-7, dominating with this third-ball loops. |
| Game Two | O'Neill leads 10-7 game point, and later leads 12-11 and 13-12 - but he can't convert, making three careless errors in a row, including missing two pop-ups. |
| Game Three | Wang takes control, and O'Neill is throwing in sidespin blocks and other changeups, trying to find a way to stop Wang's looping and get his own attack going. Wang goes up 8-4 - but O'Neill suddenly finds his attack, and pulls to 9-10, only to lose another close one, 11-9. |
| Game Four | O'Neill leads 7-3, Wang pulls to 9-7, but O'Neill wins comfortably, 11-7. |
| Game Five | At 6-6, Wang scores two in a row, then goes up 10-7 game point. O'Neill fights back, loops in a serve to pull to 9-10 - only to push Wang's serve off and lose still another close game, 11-9. |
| Game Six | O'Neill starts quickly goes up 4-1,then 5-2 - but then Wang goes on a run, winning the next five. At 5-3, Wang plays a spectacular lobbing point, and O'Neill finally misses - something you don't see him do against a lob very often. From 8-5, Wang runs it out to win the game and match, 11-7. So Wang advances to the Final Twelve. |
Left:
Coach Ping Zhang and Jiachen "David" Wang, right after he clinched his
spot in the Final Twelve.
Right: Sean O'Neill consults between games with his coach for the tournament, Ed
Levy.
Photos by Larry Hodges ©2003
After the match, Wang said, "Before the match began, I didn't think I could win because I was so tired from my seven-game match with De Tran. But Coach Ping told me that Sean was just as tired, since he also had to go seven games in his match, and he's much older than I am. He said that I wouldn't have many opportunities like this again. Also, Coach Lillieroos had had us practice when we were very tired to improve our focus when we were tired, and it helped."
O'Neill was obviously disappointed in his not advancing, especially since he had lost so many close games, even when up game point. He said, "Things that used to work for me at 10-8 weren't there in these matches. Also, my shot selection at 10-8 was poor."
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