ITF W40 Hong Kong: Taiwanese test has familiar feel for Adithya Karunaratne as Asian Games loom
- Hong Kong’s last representative at the ITF event loses in the semi-finals, but gets a stage further than at the World University Games in Chengdu
- After an injury-hit start to the year, Sri Lanka-born Karunaratne gains useful court time ahead of her first Asian Games
Home contender Adithya Karunaratne’s run ended in the semi-finals at the ITF W40 Hong Kong tournament at Victoria Park on Saturday.
After beating Liang En-shuo of Taiwan in the quarter-finals, the 21-year-old was stopped by another Taiwanese player, seventh seed Yang Ya-yi, in the last four. Yang prevailed 6-4, 7-5 after a two-hour duel.
There were echoes of this month’s World University Games in Chengdu, where Liang had also opposed Karunaratne in the last eight, beating her that time on her way to a bronze medal, while Yang had reached the final, taking silver.
Yang now finds herself in the Hong Kong final, but Karunaratne – the only Hong Kong player left after exits for Eudice Chong and Cody Wong Hong-yi – was not without chances, notably at 5-4 up in the second set.
“I think she just played better in the important moments,” Karunaratne said. “At 5-5 during my service game, she returned pretty well and then a double fault cost me.
“After that, she got the momentum and felt a bit more confident, so she started to push a little more and in the end the last few points went pretty fast.”
It was a useful warm-up for next month’s Asian Games, where Karunaratne, ranked 399th in the world, will be one of four women in the Hong Kong squad.
Born in Sri Lanka before moving to Hong Kong aged five, she had a career-high ranking of 278 early this year, but was forced to stop for four months because of a preseason ankle ligament injury.
“I’ve lost quite a bit of time in terms of competing, and this year it is quite difficult to set a goal,” she said. “So the goal this year is to just be healthy and compete as much as possible. Once I get some match practice and the rhythm of competition, I think I’ll start getting some [ranking] points again, but for now it’s time to be a little realistic.”
Meet Hong Kong tennis’ Sri Lanka-born, guitar-playing law student Karunaratne
The youngster enjoyed the ways in which the University Games differed from the routine on the regular tour.
“It was quite a unique experience, because we don’t play a lot of team events in tennis and too often you’re always alone,” she said. “[At major Games] you have your nation behind you. It’s quite an honour to be able to do that, and I love the team environment.
“I am expecting the Asian Games will be the same way, but on a larger scale.”
