Lu Kai/Liu Xiaolong 's first tournament together (?) and they acquitted themselves very well against Lee/Yoo, going down by identical score of 19-21, a very close affair.
I think Iskandar has very good potential, hope LCW can help train him personally, spar with him as often as possible and give him pointers unreservedly; maybe not just for Iskandar but also for the other youngsters as well. I feel it's high time for LCW to contribute more towards developing MAS badminton as a form of giving back to BAM and MAS as a whole.
Looks good, a match that could've gone either way, too close to call - Liu Cheng/Zhang Siwei gave their more established teammates, the newly-minted JPN Open SS'16 MD Champion, Li Jinhui/Liu Yuchen, a run for their money. But the new combination of Liu Cheng/Zheng Siwei only get to play their second tournament together, the JPN Open last week and here, after that Liu Cheng will be paired with Zhang Nan for the Premier SS DEN Open in Oct. Let's see which combination will yield better results.
Lee Jang Mi failed to live up to my expectations to advance to the semifinals when she was stopped by her fellow junior teammate Kim Ga Eun in R2 as I thought she would beat her opponent of today and then oust another teammate,Kim Hyo Min, tomorrow.
QUARTERFINALS (01.00pm, 3 court) => https://www.tournamentsoftware.com/...5929F5-694C-443E-A133-4076398D5585&d=20160930 *Match Highlights : - Hans Kristian Vittinghus (DEN) v Son Wan Ho (KOR) - Vincent Wong Wing Ki (HKG) v Tian Houwei (CHN) - Tai Tzu Ying (TPE) v Sung Ji Hyun (KOR) - Minatsu Mitani (JPN) v Chen Yufei (CHN) - Lee YD/Yoo YS (KOR) v Kamura/Sonoda (JPN) - Li JH/Liu YC (CHN) v Ahsan/Setiawan (INA) - Goh VS/Tan WK (MAS) v Chai B/Hong W (CHN) - Jung KE/Shin SC (KOR) v Fukuman/Yonao (JPN) - Ou DN/Yu XH (CHN) v Pedersen/Juhl (DEN) A disappointing ending for third seed Jan O Jorgensen as he couldn't go further in this Superseries, a fatigue is detected in physically demanding match, lost three games to local veteran Lee Hyun Il who will be tested by last year runner-up Ajay Jayaram next. Korean number one Son Wan Ho progressed smoothly and will set up a clash with the inspiring Dane Hans Kristian Vittinghus. Another home MS, 2013 World Junior Champion Heo Kwang Hee downed German fighter Marc Zwiebler and has Qiao Bin as his next hurdle. Fourth seed Tian Houwei played rubber-games once again to dump local lower-ranked Seo Seung Jae, he needs more endurance to face HKG resilient shuttler Vincent Wong WK. WS top half of draw will see an intriguing tie tomorrow, local favourite and last year winner Sung Ji Hyun has stern test to pass, Tai Tzu Ying, head to head stats favour to Taiwanese player. Two stunners, Chen Yufei and Minatsu Mitani will eye semifinal berth after both of them trounce more fancied rival at last sixteen. Chen surprised former World Champion Ratchanok Intanon while Mitani disposed Japan Open latest champion, He Bingjiao. Japan has one more quarterfinalist, Akane Yamaguchi who has bright chance to eliminate home inexperienced teen Kim Hyang Im. Men's doubles probably portrays the strongest competition of five departments here and three close encounters will be served at last eight round, Lee/Yoo edged past Chinese newest combo Liu/Lu at last sixteen and face the fast-paced Kamura/Sonoda, reigning World Champion Ahsan/Setiawan have chance to take revenge over Chinese young duo Li/Liu and rematch of gruelling Rio Olympic Games semifinal, the silver medalists Goh/Tan against Chai/Hong may find repetition tomorrow. It's KOR-JPN affairs at top half of draw will indicate long duration quarterfinal tie tomorrow, two local leading pairs Jung/Shin who succeeded to bagged Rio bronze medal meet Fukuman/Yonao and Chang/Lee will take on Matsuo/Naito. China hope in WD category will rely on two combinations in the retirement of their core double specialists, former world top ten Ou DN/Yu XH will face tough foe, Danish finest Pedersen/Juhl while the vurnerable Luo twin sisters are expected to overcome Bulgarian Stoeva sisters, Gabriela & Stefani. In mixed doubles discipline, two Danish relatively fresh partnerships, Astrup/Kjaersfeldt and Rasmussen/Thygesen will challenge the established pairs, world number one Ko SH/Kim HN and Rio silver medalist Chan PS/Goh LY respectively. China projected leading pair Zheng/Chen and Lu/Huang will face off after Japan Open semifinal last week, HKG Reginald Lee/Chau HW should grab rare opportunity to bounce back after string of unimpressive results lately, they will meet the underdog, #377 Chung/Yoo. The Korean stunned second seed Adcock, the English married couple score lacklustre performance in back to back Superseries. LIVE TV (Court 1) Matches :
Let's see if the Rio's silver medalist Goh/Tan can, at the least, go into the semi-final stage as their performance in Japan is rather disappointing. This time, they face Chai/Hong Wei to set up Rio's semifinal rematch, a tough opponent for them. Japan Open's final rematch featuring Ahsan/Setiawan facing Li/Liu will be also interesting.
Iskandar of MAS kept losing due to his experience. He kept giving easy points for Qiao Bin. When he started to catch up in the second set, it's already over for him. However, I hoped that he will bounced back again in future tournaments.
I'm keen to see if the relatively young and inexperienced Chen Yufei knows how to tackle the highly experienced and fit Mitani Minatsu who is a very good runner and retriever capable of wearing down her opponents. After overcoming an adroit offensive player of Intanon Ratchanok's calibre, Chen Yufei next has to change her strategy and game plan to deal with a player best known for her first-rate retrieving and running ability. If she has He Bingjiao's attacking prowess and technique (but not her deficient fitness), I believe she can prevail; if not, I'd like to see how she breaks down MM's resistance. By piling on the pressure with relentless attack (all-out aggression but physically highly demanding), or well-timed offense after constructing the rally (all-round abilities needed), or keep moving the opponent all over the court by accurate shot placements to get the opponent out of position (rallying, stroke play, patient manoeuvring, low rate of error needed), or try to outrun and outlast the opponent at her own game (same style as the opponent but doing it better), or what ? Indubitably,MM's experience is much superior to CYF's who only has youthful exuberance going for her. We shall see.
This is Chen Yufei's first meeting with Intanon Ratchanok. Perhaps you mixed up with He Bingjiao who incidentally has only met her twice, once at the Swiss Open in March, and last week at the JPN Open, winning on both occasions.
Nobody realise the significance of Lee Hyun Il beating JOJ. The grand old man of Korea MS 1st came out into the senior tour in 1999 playing against the likes of Paul Eric Hoyer and Rashid Sidek. His contempory PG and Taufik were already making waves. His 1st major tournament final was JO 2002 at 21years old beating a string of top players to get there. And he played against the likes of Chen Hong , Xia Xuan Zhe, Hendrawan. He almost won the AE 2006 against LD. And He is one of those players LD hate to meet and Lee HI was at his prime. Now 10 years later Lee is still beating top flight players 10 years younger. This goes to show that the current young players are not the same quality with we have seen 10 or even 20 years ago.
It's available on videostream : http://videostream.dn.ua/videopage/videoPage.php?g=c2J2b2JoK2F0Y3ZsbmhZ&c=en&i=eWlhaXVidGd1bA№f№f
Apparently, Lee Yong Dae/Yoo Yeon Seong is determined to go out with a bang in their swan song tournament together.
Too bad, at age 30, H K Vittinghus doesn't have many good years left in his career - his accumulated experience, maturity,intelligence and tenacity make him such a good player now.