Jakarta: Malaysia’s Lee Chong Wei came into Thursday afternoon’s men’s singles third round at the World Championships on a 13-match win streak against his opponent, No. 8 seed Wang Zhengming of China. In the end it was Lee who extended his streak over Wang to 14 matches, beating the Chinese 21-17, 21-19 to advance to the quarter-finals, where he will play Hu Yun who defeated No. 3 seed Kidambi Srikanth in the men’s singles third round on Thursday.
Compare to Lee, No. 5 seed Lin Dan and No. 1 seed Chen Long have a considerably easier passage into the quarters. Lin Dan simply swatted Hans-Kristian Vittinghus aside with an imperious performance, winning 21-9, 21-13 in 37 minutes; while Chen Long rolled past Tanongsak Saensomboonsuk 21-17, 21-18 in 48 minutes.
Lin Dan will face No. 2 seed Denmark Jan O Jorgensen on Friday who overcame Son Wan Ho of Korea 21-19, 21-11 on Thursday. Meanwhile, Chen Long and Viktor Axelsen will square off in the quarter-finals on Friday.
The heroic journey of Malaysian independent shuttler Zulfadli Zulkifli was ended by Wei Nan of Hong Kong on Thursday, where Zulkifli lost 15-21, 9-21 in 28 minutes. Wei will battle Kento Momota in the quarters.
On the men’s doubles side of the tournament, heavy favorites to win the title Lee Yong Dae/Yoo Yeon Seong of Korea were far too much for their compatriots Kim Gi Jung/Kim Sa Rang on Thursday, staffing off the two Kims 21-13, 21-15 in 34 minutes. Lee/Yoo will play Fu Haifeng/Zhang Nan of China in the quarter-finals. Other men’s doubles matches to watch on Friday are:
1. Mohammad Ahsan/Hendra Setiawan (Indonesia) vs Marcus Ellis/Chris Langridge (England)
2. Hiroyuki Endo/Kenichi Hayakawa (Japan) vs Angga Pratama/Ricky Karanda Suwardi (Indonesia)
3. Liu Xiaolong/Qiu Zihan (China) vs Mathias Boe/Carsten Mogensen (Denmark)
All four of the top mixed doubles seeds will be in action on Friday’s quarter-finals matches. Below is the complete list of mixed doubles quarter-finals matches:
1. Zhang Nan/Zhao Yunlei (China) vs Praveen Jordan/Debby Susanto (Indonesia)
2. Tontowi Ahmad/Liliyana Natsir (Indonesia) vs Ko Sung Hyun/Kim Ha Na (Korea)
3. Chris Adcock/Gabrielle Adcock (England) vs Liu Cheng/Bao Yixin (China)
4. Jacco Arends/Selena Piek (Netherlands) vs Xu Chen/Ma Jin (China)
