KUCHING: Pakistan pulled off an upset in the quarterfinals of the World Junior Team Boys U14 Asia-Oceania Final Qualifying tournament at the Sarawak Lawn Tennis Association (SLTA) Tennis Centre yesterday.

The eighth seeds edged second seeds Australia 2-1, with Abubakar Talha claiming the first point for Pakistan in the first singles when Taiki Takizawa retired after trailing 46, 0-3 and suffered a broken wrist following a fall.

Cooper Kose levelled the score 1-1 for Australia when he beat Hamza Roman 6-2, 6-1 in the second singles.

However, Hamza-Abubakar secured the winning point for Pakistan when they defeated Anthony Baker Nickolas-Cooper 6-1, 6-4 in the doubles.

Pakistan will now play Hong Kong in today’s semifinals after the latter edged Thailand 2-1 in the quarterfinals.

“We are happy to beat the Australians today and we had expected to win as we have good coordination and are a good team. And we all back each other up.

“We have prepared and worked very hard for this tournament and already fought to be here before we came to Kuching,” said team member Amir Muhammad Mazari.

On the semifinal against Hong Kong, Amir said they are confident of beating them and reach the final.

“We will just put in our full efforts and try to win,” he added.

Meanwhile, top seeds South Korea booked their place in the last four after they overcame the resistance put up by Chinese Taipei 2-1 and they will take on third seeds Japan who also edged seventh seeds Kazakhstan 2-1 in the other match.

In the playoff for 9th to 16th placings, New Zealand blanked Uzbekistan 3-0, Iran beat India 20 while Indonesia and Singapore scored 2-1 wins over Jordan and Kyrgyzstan respectively.