Copenhagen: Perhaps the Russian badminton fans would find this hard to believe, the Germany team that Russia defeated 5-0 two days ago, showed the same opponent some mettle and came back to win the European Mixed Team Badminton Championships semi-final tie with 3-1 on Saturday.
Germany started off with some adjustments in their lineup by replacing World No. 22 mixed doubles pair Linda Efler/Marvin Seidel with World No. 18 Isabel Herttrich/Mark Lamsfuss. The tweak proved to be quite beneficial to the German team as Herttrich/Lamsfuss stormed past Ekaterina Bolotova/Vladimir Ivanov 22-20, 21-10 to score the first point for their team.
Russia’s World No. 61 men’s singles Vladimir Malkov was still a consistent point producer when he levelled the tie to 1-1 after overcoming Kai Schaefer 21-13, 14-21, 21-16 in 66 minutes.
Yvonne Li played a solid women’s singles match to give Germany a 2-1 lead as she exacted revenge on Evgeniya Kosetskaya with a hard-fought 21-17, 16-21, 17-21 win. Li lost to Kosetskaya two days ago with 18-21, 15-21.
Germany’s World No. 29 Mark Lamsfuss/Marvin Seidel who lost to Vladimir Ivanov/Ivan Sozonov of Russia by two points two days ago, came roaring out of the gate and jumped out to a commanding 21-14, 21-19 victory to clinched the tie for Germany with 3-1.
Both sides agreed to skip the women’s doubles match after the result had already been decided.
“I’m so excited to be able to reach the final by beating Russia today,” said Lamsfuss.
“If we play our best, we can beat anybody,” said Seidel after the semi-final victory.
Meanwhile, in the other semi-final, Denmark seized control of the tie against Netherlands on Saturday, after clean sweeping the Dutch team 3-0 to advance into the final.
