Kuala Lumpur: Malaysia’s two-time World Junior champion (2015, 2018) Goh Jin Wei may have a relatively comfortable victory in the first round of Malaysia Masters by beating World No. 16 Zhang Beiwen of USA 21-19, 21-18. But the World No. 69 Malaysian has a tough task ahead of her as she prepares to face the World No. 2 Tai Tzu Ying of Taiwan in the second round.
“I will try to make sure every shot could product point in the action against Tzu Ying tomorrow. I am ready to put on my best game and try to beat her,” said Goh.
“We have met before but I will try to put pressure on Tzu Ying. I hope all the supporters will give us their support. I also wanted to learn from Tzu Ying as well,” added Goh.
This would be the second head-to-head encounter between the two as Tai won their first face-off in the 2018 Malaysia Open quarter-finals by 21-15, and 21-15.
Tai who lost to Chen Yu Fei of China 21-19, 13-21, 15-21 in the Malaysia Open semi-finals last Saturday, notched up a first-round win against Sim Yu Jin of Korea 21-11, 21-8 in the Malaysia Masters first round.
In addition to the match between Goh and Tai, there is no shortage of exciting matches on Thursday, including unseeded mixed doubles pair Chan Peng Soon/Cheah Yee See was scheduled to take on the No. 2 seeds Zheng Si Wei/Huang Ya Qiong of China.
Another Malaysian mixed doubles pair – World No. 15 Goh Soon Huat/Shevon Jemie Lai will meet World No. 227 Hafiz Faizal/Serena Kani of Indonesia for a spot in the quarter-finals.
The men’s singles category saw World No. 48 Ng Tze Yong became the only Malaysian player left in the tournament. He will challenge World No. 4, Chou Tien Chen of Taiwan, in the second round.
In the men’s doubles competition, World No. 6 Aaron Chia/Soh Wooi Yik who defeated World No. 22 Akira Koga/Taichi Saito 21-16, 21-19 in the first round, are going to face off against former World No. 2 pair – Kim Gi-Jung/Kim Sa-Rang of Korea in the second round.
Speaking to reporters after their first-round win on Tuesday, Chia was cautious when asked about their chances against the two Kims.
“They are good players, we’ve played against them in the Indonesia Open first round,” said Chia.
“It’s not easy playing against them, we won’t take it easy,” added Chia.
“We’ll treat it as an important game, and will do our best,” continued Chia.
Another Malaysian men’s doubles pair – Goh V Shem/Low Juan Shen, was also handed an incredibly challenging second-round match when they meet the No. 2 seeds and last week’s Malaysia Open champions – Takuro Hoki/Yugo Kobayashi on Thursday.
