World No. 1 Lee Chong cruised through yet another match at the inaugural Super Series Masters Finals yesterday, in an assured victory over Hong Kong’s Chan Yan Kit.
The encounter stretched over three games but the Malaysian star never looked in trouble before closing the match 21-13 20-22 21-8 in his third win of the tournament.
Topping Group A, he was waiting to find out who his semi-final opponent would be, with Indonesia’s Taufik Hidayat the most likely contender.
SECOND SPOT
Hidayat was due to play England’s Andrew Smith later yesterday and a win would have been good enough to secure him second spot in Group B.
Meanwhile the Malaysian men’s doubles pairs had mixed fortunes on the second day of the tournament.
Koo Kien Kiat and Tan Boon Heong chalked up their second straight win while the pairing of Mohd Zakry Abdul Latif and Mohd Fairuzizuan Mohd Tazari were crushed.
Koo and Tan defeated Tony Gunawan and Candra Wijaya, the veteran USA/Indonesian pair, 21-16 21-11 in less than 30 minutes to secure a semi-final place from Group B.
Second seeds Zakry and Fairuzizuan succumbed to an onslaught by the crack Korean pair of Jung Jae-sung and Lee Yong-dae, with a 21-17, 21-16 scoreline in 34 minutes in a Group A match.
Later yesterday, Koo and Tan were scheduled to take on the top seeds Markis Kido and Hendra Setiawan to decide which team tops the group.
AFTERNOON GAME
Kido and Setiawan beat Denmark’s Mathias Boe and Carsten Mogensen 17-21, 21-19, 21-14 in an afternoon game for their second group win.
Chris Adcock and Robert Blair stood in the way of Zakry and Fairuzizuan reaching the semi-finals, but the Malaysians were expected to have no difficulty beating the English pair in their match last year.
In the women’s singles Tine Rasmussen of Denmark, the second seed, beat Wong Mew Choo of Malaysia 21-7 21-19.
There were also wins for No.1 seed Zhou Mi of Hong Kong against Japan’s Hirayama Yu, Saina Nehwal of India, who beat France’s Pi Hongyan 21-18 21-13, and Wang Chen of Hong Kong who defeated Xu Huaiwen of Germany 21-12, 16-21, 21-11.
The season-ending Super Series Masters Finals began on Thursday in Kota Kinabalu.
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