Huelva: Denmark’s World No. 3 Anders Antonsen has reached the 2021 BWF World Championships semi-finals, after his quarter-final opponent, Lee Zii Jia of Malaysia retired in the third set due to toe injury on Friday. The final score for the match was 12-21, 21-8, 11-1.
“Lee has played a lot of tournaments in the last few months, and he also played three three-set matches here, and I was confident that I was a fresher player on the court today,” said Antonsen.
“Unfortunately he had an injury and had to pull out. That’s not the way I want to win the match,” added Antonsen.
“I wish him a speedy recovery,” concluded Antonsen.
Antonsen will play Singapore’s World No. 22 Loh Kean Yew on Saturday.
Meanwhile, Loh’s strong run of form has continued in Huelva, where he beat No. 32 HS Prannoy of India 21-14, 21-12 on his way to the semi-finals.
“It was a good match against Prannoy. He is very strong in attack, and his defense is also pretty good, it’s not easy to kill him,” said Loh after the match.
Loh told reporters that he was looking forward to facing Anders Antonsen in the semi-final.
“Antonsen is a very strong player, he has great follow up, and great offense and defense as well,” added Loh.
“I am looking forward to playing him for the first time at the big stage,” continued Loh.
India was guaranteed at least a silver medal in this year’s World Championships as two Indian players – World No. 14 Kidambi Srikanth and World No. 19 Lakshya Sen will face off against each other in another men’s semi-final.
In men’s doubles, Malaysia’s World No. 12 Ong Yew Sin/Teo Ee Yi pulled off the biggest upset in the men’s doubles category as they beat the Tokyo Olympics gold medalists – Lee Yang/Wang Chi-Lin of Taiwan 12-21, 21-17, 21-15 in 65 minutes.
Ong/Teo earned a chance to exact revenge against World No. 4 Takuro Hoki/Yugo Kobayashi for their two consecutive losses two weeks ago in the World’s semi-final. Ong/Teo lost to Hoki/Kobayashi on Dec 3, 2021, in the BWF World Tour Finals Group B match, and then lost to the same opponents on Dec 4, 2021, in the BWF World Tour Finals knock out stage.
At the men’s doubles bottom half, Malaysia’s Rio Olympics silver medalists – Goh V Shem/Tan Wee Kiong played their farewell match as a pair on Friday after they found no answer to strong smashes from World No. 24 He Ji Ting/Tan Qiang of China, losing 22-20, 21-14.
He/Tan will play World No. 10 Kim Astrup/Anders Skaarup Rasmussen of Denmark in another men’s doubles semi-final.
