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Heroes of Hong Kong: Dikosavljevic, Johnson go back-to-back in singles as Patriquin, Staksrud capture second title of 2026
The Hang Seng Bank Hong Kong Slam concluded early Sunday morning with the gold medal matches in all five pro events.
Let’s get into some of the top storylines from Kai Tak Arena.
Starting in women’s singles, Andie Dikosavljevic won her second singles title in as many weeks with a dominant 11-1, 11-5 victory over Judit Castillo.
Those two also met in the final of last week’s Australia Pickleball Cup, where Dikosavljevic won 11-6, 11-6; the Aussie replicated that success in Hong Kong for her second straight gold medal and 18th international PPA Tour title.
Hunter Johnson found similar success in men’s singles, as he followed up his Australia title with another gold medal in Hong Kong by way of an 11-4, 6-11, 11-7 victory over Tama Shimabukuro.
This was the first meeting between the two since Shimabukuro notched a three-game win in the semifinals of the Atlanta Pickleball Championships back in May.
Johnson expects to have many more battles with the 15-year-old in the future.
‘We’re probably going to meet each other a ton more times, hopefully in the finals,” he said. “[Tama] definitely has a bright future, as does the sport of pickleball.”
Elsewhere, Anna Leigh Waters captured two golds alongside Anna Bright and Ben Johns in women’s doubles and mixed doubles, respectively.
In men’s doubles, Hayden Patriquin and Federico Staksrud won their second title of 2026 with an 11-6, 11-8 victory over Ben Johns and Gabe Tardio.
This win caps off what was a clean week from the newly reunited partnership, as they didn’t drop a game through five matches on their way to gold.
“It was a great tournament for us,” Staksrud mentioned afterwards. “I think we played really well in all the matches that we played, and we’re finding a groove. We didn’t play together for the first half of the year, and in the second half we’re just getting started. It’s the second month of us playing together again, and we just want to get better and better and compete against the best guys.”
With two large-scale international events now in the rearview mirror, most players will return to the U.S. to prepare for the upcoming Major League Pickleball Nations Cup and Opendoor Pickleball World Championships in Dallas, TX.
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