Sydney: Two-time Olympic champion Lin Dan was forced to dig deep on Thursday before defeating Parupalli Kashyap of India 21-17, 20-22, 21-14 to advance into Australian Open quarter-finals.
Lin will next face Indonesia’s Asian Games champion Jonatan Christie on Friday.
Christie, on the other hand, was barely troubled by Tanongsak Saensomboonsuk of Thailand as he eased past the Thai player 21-15, 21-15.
Soong Joo Ven became the sole Malaysian men’s singles representative at the tournament after seeing off Sitthikom Thammasin of Thailand 25-23, 21-16. Soong will take on No. 1 seed Chou Tien Chen of Taiwan in the last eight.
Meanwhile, the top seeded Chou moved serenely through to the quarter-finals on Thursday with a 21-17, 21-17 win over Malaysia’s Daren Liew.
In mixed doubles, Malaysia’s Rio Olympic mixed doubles silver medalists Chan Peng Soon/Goh Liu Ying have secured their quarter-final place with a 21-19, 21-15 win over China’s Ren Xiangyu/Zhou Chaomin.
Tan/Goh’s next opponent will be Indonesia’s Praveen Jordan/Melati Daeva Oktavianti, whom Chan/Goh defeated 14-21, 21-16, 29-27 in an epic New Zealand Open final that lasted one hour 25 minutes in Auckland on May 5.
In women’s singles, both No. 3 seed PV Sindhu and No. 7 seed Li Xuerui were eliminated by two unseeded Thai players, Nitchaon Jindapol and Busanan Ongbamrungphan respectively.
Interestingly, both Thai players will face each other in the quarter-finals on Friday.
