Wuhan: Malaysia’s World No. 15 men’s doubles pair Aaron Chia/Soh Wooi Yik fell short in their bid to become the first Malaysian pair to win the Badminton Asia Championships (BAC) since Choong Tan Fook/Lee Wan Wah won it in 2006, 2007, as the young Malaysian pair lost a hard-fought battle to World No. 41 Kang Min Hyuk/Kim Won Ho of South Korea 15-21, 21-16, 18-21 in the quarter-finals on Friday.
After the tournament, Chia/Soh will fly directly to New Zealand to compete at the New Zealand Open which will kick start the one-year Olympic qualifying period next Tuesday.
The unseeded Kang/Kim will next face No. 5 seeds Hiroyuki Endo/Yuta Watanabe of Japan in the semi-finals.
Hiroyuki Endo/Yuta Watanabe, on the other hand, defeated world champions Li Junhui/Liu Yuchen 21-19, 21-18 to advance to the last four.
In other men’s doubles quarter-final matches, Indonesian World No. 1 pair Marcus Fernaldi Gideon/Kevin Sanjaya Sukamuljo also earned a ticket to the semi-finals after overcoming Han Chengkai/Zhou Haodong of China 21-13, 19-21, 21-16 at the Wuhan Sports Center Gymnasium on Friday.
Gideon/Sukamuljo levelled their career meeting record against Han/Zhou to 2-2 after Friday’s victory. The No. 1 seeds from Indonesia will play last year’s runners-up Takeshi Kamura/Keigo Sonoda on Saturday.
