Dubai: Malaysia endured a tough day in Dubai on Friday when it suffered a 2-3 defeat in the quarter-finals of the 2023 Badminton Asia Mixed Team Championship (BAMTC).
Although the World No. 4 Lee Zii Jia lost to HS Prannoy in the last Group B tie against India, he was still spearheading the campaign in the men’s singles match. Lee was facing World No. 121 Lei Lanxi of China, and he quickly gave Malaysia a 1-0 lead by beating Lei 21-16, 22-20.
In the women’s singles match that followed, World No. 31 Goh Jin Wei faced off against World No. 101 Gao Fangjie, who just returned to international competition end of last year after she damaged her Achilles tendon in the left ankle and had to be wheeled out of the court at the 2019 Malaysia Masters.
Both Goh and Gao had met once in the 2016 Indonesia Masters quarter-finals, where Goh won 21-16, 21-18. But today Gao withstood the pressure from Goh to prevail 15-21, 21-13, 21-19.
As the overall score was leveled at 1-1, Malaysia chose to rest reigning men’s doubles World Champions – Aaron Chia/Soh Wooi Yik, instead, they field World No. 8 Ong Yew Sin/Teo Ee Yi to take on He Jiting and Zhou Haodong. At the Australia Open last November, Ong/Teo outlasted the World No. 21 Chinese pair 14-21, 21-17, 21-18. However, this time, Ong/Teo lost in straight sets 22-24, 18-21.
The tie went down to the wire after 2022 French Open women’s doubles champion Pearly Tan/Thinaah Muralitharan of Malaysia defeated Liu Sheng Shu/Tan Ning of China 21-17, 12-21, 21-19.
Unfortunately, Tan Kian Meng/Lai Pei Jing did their best but were not good enough to lift Malaysia to the semi-finals by going down to the 2023 Indonesia Masters and 2023 Thailand Masters champions – Feng Yanzhe/Huang Dongping 15-21, 23-25.
China will play India in the semi-finals while Korea will take on Thailand for a final berth on Saturday.
