The two semifinals in men’s doubles resulted in an all Danish final on Sunday. Second seeds Mads Conrad-Petersen and Mads Pieler Kolding will face third seeds Kim Astrup and Anders Skaarup Rasmussen.
Conrad and Kolding played a thrilling three games against Russia’s Vladimir Ivanov and Ivan Sozonov. The Danes got off to a good start, but the Russian fought back and gave the crowd an entertaining match.
- We know the Russians are very, very good and we always have tight matches against them actually, so we were a little bit surprised that we won the first one that easily, Conrad said after the 21-11, 19-21, 21-19-match.
- They stepped up and performed some of their best game, and we know when they do that they are extremely hard to beat, Kolding pointed out.
Underdogs have their eyes on the top spot
Kolding and Conrad won the gold in 2016 and are hoping to bring the same level and amount of fighting spirit from the court court today into the final, when they face their team mates from the Danish national centre.
- We don’t mind taking the underdog-role, but we know them so well. We know their world ranking and their results and they are a really good pair, so we are happy to be in a final and we are happy to hopefully get a good match tomorrow. But we have our eyes on the top of the podium that’s for sure, Skaarup Rasmussen said in the mixed zone after the semifinal.
Skaarup Rasmussen and Astrup beat Jelle Maas and Ruben Tabling from the Netherlands 21-15, 21-18, in the other men’s doubles semifinal.