Taiwan may well have a new tennis superstar in the making, and Melbourne witnessed just what he can do yesterday.
In the boys' singles competition at the Australian Open, 16-year-old tenth seed Yang Tsung-hua (楊宗樺) beat fourth seed Ryan Harrison of the US in straight sets, 6-4, 7-6 (9-7) in the semi-finals. He will meet fifth seed Bernard Tomic of Australia, who beat Yuki Bhambri of India 6-0, 5-7, 6-1, in today's final.
Yang, who has just been named in Taiwan's Davis Cup team, broke Harrison's serve in the first game of the match, and then held his serve to take the set 6-4.
PHOTO: HUANG CHIH-YUAN, TAIPEI TIMES
In the second set, both players held their serves until the eighth game, when Harrison broke Yang, only for Yang to break back in the following game, setting up a tie break. At 6-7 down in the tie break, Yang won both his serves to lead 8-7 and then immediately converted his first match point to take the tie breaker 9-7.
Yang then powered his way to the final by taking a one-sided third set 6-1 against a wilting Harrison.
Once Yang had completed that victory, he joined up with doubles partner Hsieh Cheng-peng (謝正鵬) to triumph in the boys' doubles tournament. They beat the second seeds, Vasek Pospisil of Canada and Cesar Ramirez of Mexico, 3-6, 7-5, 10-5.
PHOTO: HUANG CHIH-YUAN, TAIPEI TIMES
In the first set, both pairs held their serves through the sixth game. In the seventh Hsieh was broken, as was Yang in the ninth, giving their opponents a one set lead.
In the second set, Ramirez lost his serve at 5-6, handing Hsieh and Yang the second set.
The third set was the first pair to 10 games and Hsieh and Yang quickly took command, rushing to an 8-2 lead before finally winning the set 10-5.
Although Taiwan's Yi Chu-huan (易楚寰) won the boys' doubles together with South Korean Kim Sun-yong at the 2005 Australian Open, this win marks the first time an all-Taiwanese team has won a doubles championship of this stature.
Yang will be looking to better that in tomorrow afternoon's singles final. Either way, it looks like the start of a very promising career.
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