Treesa befuddles HK pair with stop-drops to storm into Swiss Open semis

The number of times Treesa got both Pui Lam Yeung and Nga Ting Yeung of Hong Kong stumbling and falling forward, deceived by her stop-drops, wasn’t merely about the difference in their rankings. The Indians are World No. 9, the Yeungs No. 14. Older and more experienced, the HK pair had turned the tables on the Indians two seasons ago. But Treesa left them utterly befuddled at the Swiss Open, as the Indians reached the semis with a 21-18, 21-14 win.

Crucially, when they take on top seeds Liu Sheng Shu-Tan Ning in the Last 4 on Saturday at Basel, the Chinese will start out guessing which game style the Indians bring out, with Treesa being the shape shifter with her attack and faux-attack, the straight smashes and the loopy edgeways drops. The straight drops that she played against the Hong Kong pair are even more boggling.

It is not even that the Hong Kong duo didn’t figure out what Treesa was doing. Her stop drops were falling from net to midcourt, with a variety of parabolas. There was deception alright, because she jumped as if to smash, and almost always never went for the full-blooded one. That half of the trick is textbook bamboozle – opponents start scampering back thinking the smash will whiz deep and fast.

But even when the Yeungs started moving forward, Treesa would float them closer and even closer still to the net, and as a result one of the Yeungs would inevitably fall short and fumble forward to the floor.

It’s wrist-work that can at times need tighter control than torquing the big smash. But these came towards the endgame when the Indians employ a decidedly different style than what they play till around point 14. Before that, there were some sloppy errors as the HK duo came back from 9-13 down to level at 13-all.

Gayatri was doing her thing – catching the shuttle early and high and stabbing it back with a rubberband snap, almost like getting rid of it which meant she was rushing the Yeungs. But as soon as the endgame was on the horizon in the opening set, Treesa got her drops looping like ribbons. The difference in her smash leadup and the drop is near imperceptible. But it was also the precision of placement.

Yeungs would discover this is a very different pair than the one they beat at Singapore with a sleight shot at the end in 2023.

The second set was pretty one-sided with the Indians going from 8-7 to 15-7 in quick time. But it was that point at 15-7 where Treesa’s absolute bundle of talent won them one of the most unlikely points. She was dispatched to the far side corner and then pulled back to the centre of the court from the Hong Kong riposte.

Treesa mid-lateral sprint would whack at the shuttle in what would be her outer orbit of reach and still manage to sheath a soft subtle curving drop with that same aggressive charge. She was the only player of the four completely out of position, but she nailed a perfectly placed drop.

The Chinese play a speedy, aggressive style where power shots hit the floor like full stops. But the Indians have routinely managed to annoy them by never sticking to any fixed plan and making them scamper about. Continuing that for two full sets or three, though, is a different challenge. Just as well, Treesa can also fall back on her full-throttle smash.