Lucy Shuker finishes as women's doubles runner-up at Japan Open
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Lucy Shuker narrowly missed out on her second Super Series title of 2025 after the British No.1 and Dutch partner Aniek van Koot finished runners-up in the women’s doubles at the Japan Open after a tense deciding match tie-break.
Cajun Classic champions in March, second seeds Shuker and Van Koot ended the 13-match winning streak of Australian Open champions Li Xiaohio and Wang Ziying in the semi-finals, coming from behind to complete a 3-6, 6-2, 10-5 victory to halt the Chinese duo’s bid for a fifth successive title.
However, despite having match point against top seeds Manami Tanaka and Zhu Zhenzhen, Shuker and Van Koot were unable to get over the line as the Japanese-Chinese duo prevailed 7-6(4), 2-6, 12-10.
Shuker’s singles campaign came to an early end after a 6-4, 3-6, 6-3 loss to Jinte Bos of the Netherlands, but there was better news for Ben Bartram and Andrew Penney in the men’s singles.
Bartram beat Japan’s Yudai Kawai 6-2, 6-1 before taking a set off a top 10 opponent for the first time this season, but he was unable to sustain his second set effort and eventually lost out in the second round 6-1, 2-6, 6-2 against world No.7 and fourth seed Daniel Caverzaschi of Spain.
Meanwhile, Penney reached the second round of a Super Series tournament in both singles and doubles for the first time, defeating China’s Dong Shunjiang 6-4, 3-6, 6-2 before bowing out to Israeli eighth seed Sergei Lysov 7-6(6), 6-2.
Bartram and Lysov experienced an early doubles loss to eventual semi-finalists Daisuke Arai of Japan and Rpbin Groenewoud of the Netherlands, losing out 6-4, 6-4.
But there was more success for Penney and his doubles partner, Ho Won Im of South Korea, the duo racing past Japan’s Hiroyuki Takeda and Ryoichi To before their title challenge ended against second seeds and recent Korea Open champions Martin de la Puente of Spain and Ruben Spaargaren of the Netherlands 6-0, 6-2.
After a first round bye, Greg Slade’s quad singles campaign came to an early end after Canadian seventh seed Robert Shaw progressed to the quarter-finals 7-6(11), 6-1.
Meanwhile, Slade’s hopes of reaching a second success quad doubles final partnering Turkey’s Ahmet Kaplan progressed as far as the quarter-finals after a 6-0, 6-1 victory over Japanese duo Daisuke Ishito and Chihiro Yoshikawa.
However, the draw pitted Slade and Kaplan against Sam Schroder of the Netherlands and David Wagner of the USA, the same duo who had beaten Slade and Kaplan in the final of the Korea Open, and once again the second seeds had the upper hand as they progressed 6-1, 7-5 before finishing the tournament as runners-up.
