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HANGZHOU – Indonesian women’s doubles, Apriyani Rahayu/Siti Fadia Silva Ramadhanti, managed to make a brilliant comeback against Japanese duo, Mayu Matsumoto/Wakana Nagahara, in the first match of Group A BWF World Tour Finals (WTF) 2023. Through a rubber game lasting 1 hour 23 minutes they won with a score of 11-21, 21-16 and 21-18.
In action at the Hangzhou Olympic Sports Center Gymnasium, Hangzhou, China, Wednesday (13/12/2023) afternoon WIB, Prifad – as Apriyani/Fadia is known – was still able to keep up with Matsumoto/Nagahara’s game at the start of the match even though they were 3-4 behind. After that, they started making their own mistakes so they fell further behind at numbers 3-8.
However, the pair ranked seventh in the world are slowly getting out of the pressure and closing in at 8-10. Unfortunately, Matsumoto/Nagahara played very well after that and came back away with a 13-8 lead.
Apriyani/Fadia really had difficulty facing the deadly attacks launched by the Sakura Country duo. They are even further behind at 10-16.
Without any significant difficulties, Matsumoto/Nagahara reaped point after point the results of their equally good attacking and defensive play. As a result, they managed to close the first game with a landslide score of 21-11.
Prifad started the second game well where they immediately took a 3-1 lead. Even though their opponents were able to equalize at 3-3 due to successive mistakes from Apriyani, they were able to take the lead again at 5-3 and then 6-4.
The score was tied again at 7-7, but Matsumoto/Nagahara made a lot of their own mistakes after that. As a result, the Red-White pair managed to enter the second game interval first with an 11-8 advantage.
After the break, Apriyani/Fadia implemented a more attacking game and overwhelmed the opponent. As a result, they were able to widen their lead to five points with a score of 15-10. The 2023 Hong Kong Open champion finally won in the second game with a score of 21-16.
Appearing confident at the start of the deciding game, Prifad was able to lead 5-1 and then 7-3, but they made consecutive mistakes so that their opponents were able to take the lead at 8-7. Luckily, they quickly found their best touch again to take the lead again 12-8.
Continuing to press, Apriyani/Fadia continued to maintain their lead at 15-10 and 17-13. Long rallies took place at critical points. Even though Matsumoto was close at 17-19, the PBSI Pelatnas duo managed to lock in victory in the third game with a score of 21-18.
(sto)