Chong Wei to face Chinese youngster in quarter-finals

Posted by Lucas Liau Lee Chong Wei, News 8:40 AM

PETALING JAYA: Malaysian world number one Lee Chong Wei will be keen to avoid losing to a youngster from China for the second time this year when he gets into action in the quarter-finals of the China Masters today.

Yesterday, Chong Wei made it to the last eight after disposing of England’s Rajiv Ouseph 21-15, 21-8 in just 27 minutes to set up a meeting with China’s rising star Du Pengyu.

Pengyu flexed his muscles to stun fifth seed Joachim Persson of Denmark 20-22, 21-14, 22-20 in a tight second round match.

In April, China’s world junior champion Chen Long scalped Chong Wei in the opening match of the India Open.

National singles chief coach Rashid Sidek feels that Chong Wei should have no problem getting past Pengyu to set up a tantalising semi-final date with either China’s Lin Dan or South Korea’s Park Sung-hwan.

“Among China’s rising players, Chen Long is better than Du Pengyu and, I think, Chong Wei should win. In fact, even our back-up shuttler Chong Wei Feng had beaten Pengyu at the German Open this year,” said Rashid.

“Wei Feng, however, lost to Pengyu in the Asian Championships and the Macau Open. This Chinese youngster is a fighter and Chong Wei will have to be wary.

“Hopefully, the semi-final will be between Chong Wei and Lin Dan.” The other two quarter-finals also promise to be interesting affairs with Peter-Gade Christensen of Denmark taking on Boonsak Ponsana of Thailand and World Championships runner-up Chen Jin squaring off with Chen Long.

It was a double delight for Malaysia in the doubles when veterans Choong Tan Fook-Lee Wan Wah and Gan Teik Chai-Tan Bin Shen marched into the quarter-finals.

Tan Fook-Wan Wah dropped a game before defeating China’s Chai Biao-Zhang Nan 21-16, 10-21, 21-9 while Teik Chai-Bin Shen made short work of Huang Haitao-Lei Weiliang of China for a 21-6, 21-16 win.

Of the two Malaysian pairs, it will be tougher for Teik Chai-Bin Shen to get to the semi-finals as they will face eighth seeds Cho Gun-woo-Yoo Yeon-seong of South Korea.

Tan Fook-Wan Wah will have China’s youngsters Li Tian-Shen Ye to deal with in the last eight.