Kuala Lumpur: Malaysia’s World No. 9 men’s doubles pair, Aaron Chia/Soh Wooi Yik who emerged runners-up in the Toyota Thailand Open final on January 24, 2021, are now preparing for the European Tour involving the Swiss Open which will be held in Basel from March 2, 2021, to March 7, 2021, and the All England Championships which will take place in Birmingham, from March 17, 2021, to March 21, 2021, as the German Open has been canceled due to concerns over the COVID-19 pandemic.
Chia said he will give his best, be more consistent and will try to advance to the Swiss Open final as it’s the first tournament in 2021 that offers Olympics qualifying points.
“Wooi Yik and I learned a lot after the three tournaments in Thailand. We are getting used to being in a competition situation, but we are still trying to find our rhythm,” said Chia.
“We identified many of our weaknesses and will need to discuss it with the coach so that he could help us work on improving these areas,” added Chia.
Since being paired in 2017, Chia/Soh have won the gold medal at the 2019 Sea Games in the Philippines. However, they have yet to win a BWF sanctioned tournament, with the best achievement of appearing in five finals, including the 2017 Tata Open India International, 2018 Malaysia International, 2018 Vietnam International, 2019 All England, and 2021 Toyota Thailand Open.
After the Chinese New Year holiday, the Malaysian national badminton team has returned to training at the Academy Badminton Malaysia (ABM).
