Basel: Malaysia’s World No. 5 mixed double pair Chan Peng Soon/Goh Liu Ying’s dream of winning their first World Championship medal didn’t materialize after they were denied by Japan’s World No. 3 Yuta Watanabe/Arisa Higashino in the World Championships quarter-finals on Friday.
Chan/Goh started the match strong as they quickly race to 16-5 in the first set to win 21-18. However, the fact that they were allowing Watanabe/Higashino to close the enormous gap on them in the first set showed they somehow lost their concentration at the end of first game. This particular issue became a major problem for the Malaysian pair in the second and third set as Watanabe/Higashino were on a roll in confidence and kept their momentum going to turn around the final outcome with an 18-21, 21-12, 21-11 victory.
After Friday’s match, Watanabe/Higashino narrowed their career meeting record over Chan/Goh to 3-4 and will face World No. 1 Zheng Si Wei/Huang Ya Qiong of China in the semi-finals, while Thailand’s World No. 4 Dechapol Puavaranukroh/Sapsiree Taerattanachai will clash with World No. 2 Wang Yi Lyu/Huang Dong Ping of China next.
In women’s competition, India’s 2017, 2018 World Championship women’s singles silver medalist P. V. Sindhu has advanced to the semi-finals after digging deep to beat World No. 2 Tai Tzu Ying of Taiwan 12-21, 23-21, 21-19 in 71 minutes. Sindhu will face World No. 3 Chen Yufei of China on Saturday.
Meanwhile, World No. 6 Ratchanok Intanon of Thailand will meet World No. 4 Nozomi Okuhara for a final berth.
Women’s doubles No. 7 seeds Du Yue/Li Yin Hui of China survived a spirited challenge from Japan’s No. 3 seeds Misaki Matsutomo/Ayaka Takahashi, winning 23-25, 21-18, 25-23 in the longest match on Friday which lasted 126 minutes. Du/Li will play another Japanese pair, No. 2 seeds Yuki Fukushima/Sayaka Hirota in the last four.
