Macau: Malaysia’s hope fizzled out after all 3 pairs were defeated in the semifinals of Macau Open Grand Prix Gold Badminton Championship held at the Tap Seac Multisport Pavilion on Saturday.
The No. 3 seeds mixed doubles pair Tan Kian Meng/Lai Pei Jing traded punches in the second against No. 7 seeds Tang Chun Man/Tse Ying Suet of Hong Kong, saving 9 match points before Tan/Lai finally cracked to go down 15-21, 28-30 in that exhilarating semi-finals encounter. The Hong Kong pair will play unseeded Zhang Nan/Li Yinhui of China in the final.
Women’s doubles No. 2 seeds Vivian Hoo/Woon Khe Wei found themselves playing through an unheralded pair Anggia Shitta Awanda/Mahadewi Istirani Ni Ketut in the semi-finals as they weren’t able to match the intensity, speed and resilience from the Indonesians to lose 21-13, 19-21 and 10-21 in 61 minutes.
In a one-sided affair, another Malaysian women’s doubles pair, Chow Mei Kuan/Lee Meng Yean were demolished by No. 1 seeds Qingchen/Jia Yifan of China 15-21 and 9-21.
Men’s singles top seed Chou Tien Chen of Taiwan is set to play Zhao Jun Peng of China in the finals on Sunday.
