Mexico City: Although still fresh from their victory at the USA Grand Prix last weekend, the men’s doubles No. 2 seeds Goh V Shem and Tan Wee Kiong looked sluggish in the second set, and were pushed to three sets before beating Michael Fuchs/Johannes Schoettler of Germany 21-19, 14-21, 21-9 in the Mexico City Grand Prix quarter-finals on Friday. Goh and Tan will play Bodin Issara and Nipitphon Puangpuapech of Thailand to seek a final berth.
Women’s doubles No. 1 seeds Vivian Hoo/Woon Khe Wei showed some serious guts, fighting back from a one set deficit to rattled Heather Olver and Lauren Smith of England just enough to get them out of rhythm and earned a quarter-final victory with 17-21, 21-11, 21-17 in 56 minutes. Hoo/Woon are set to play Shizuka Matsuo/Mami Naito of Japan in the semi-finals.
Meanwhile, Chan Peng Soon/Goh Liu Ying raced into the mixed doubles semi-finals with an exhilarating display of all-around badminton on Friday, rallied from a set down to see off Japan’s Kenta Kazuno/Ayane Kurihara 21-14, 7-21, 21-16 in 57 minutes.
In men’s singles, Artem Pochtarev of Ukraine pulled off a huge upset by defeating No. 1 seed Ajay Jayaram of India 12-21, 21-14, 21-14 in 48 minutes to set up a semi-final clash with Pannawit Thongnuam from Thailand on Saturday.
Malaysia’s sole representative in men’s singles No. 7 seed Zulfadli Zulkiffli couldn’t topple the 33-year-old No. 2 seed Sho Sasaki from Japan, losing to the Japanese 12-21, 12-21. Sasaki will play No. 3 seed Lee Dong Keun of Korea in the semi-finals.
