BIMANTARA CUP 2010: Bad day for Malaysians
News 10:46 AM
Malaysia suffered a major setback when Loh Wei Sheng, the No 2 seed, and the women’s doubles pair of Sonia Cheah-Yang Li Liang, the 3-4th seed, crashed out of the BWF World Junior Championships for the Bimantara Cup in Guadalajara, Mexico on Thursday.
Also shown the exit were China’s Li Gen-Xia Huan, the 3-4th seeds in the mixed doubles. Korea’s Choy Hye In also lost to India’s P.V.Sindhu on the second day of the individual event at the CODE Dome.Wei Sheng’s loss was a big blow to the Malaysians squad as they were banking on the Asian Junior Championships silver medallist to continue its tradition of winning at least one gold medal since 2007. 
But that was not to be as Wei Sheng had a poor game and could hardly do anything to stop India’s H.S Prannoy from recording a 21-16, 21-19 win over the Malaysian.
“His anticipation was poor and he was complete off form,” said Malaysia team manager Teoh Teng Chor.
“It is a big disappointment as a lot was expected from him. But it is not the end and it is now time for the other players to rise to the occasion.”
But in the women’s doubles, disaster struck again for Malaysia as Sonia-Yang were bundled put by Russia’s Anastasia Chervykova-Maria Korobeyinkova 21-9, 23-25, 21-18.
China also suffered a minor setback when Li Gen-Xia Huan fell to a 22-20, 25-23 defeat to Chinese Taipei’s Lin Chia Yu-Lee Fang Yu.
The 3-4th seeded Chinese started well but could not sustain their tempo as Lin-Lee displayed great maturity and variation in their play to trouble the Chinese.
In the men’s doubles competition, Mexico’s Andres Lopez and Jonathan Mondragon could not curtail England’s Matthew Nottingham and Christopher Coles, who are ranked in the top 10 and who managed to kick the locals out of the championship after scoring a 21-4, 21-5 win.
Despite the setback from Li Gen-Xia Huan, China were hardly troubled with Liu Kai overpowering Peru’s Ignacio de Vinatea in two games characterised by a series of non-stop points by Liu to finish the first game with a score of 21-6.
With a little more resistance from Peru, though not enough, the second set marked 21-12 in Liu’s favour who happens to be ranked within the top 16 and who is well on his way to place higher in the rankings.
Thai player Pisit Poodchalat, who’s trying to hold on to ranking 3 and 4, easily eliminated Japan’s Sohei Hoshino, leaving him out of the tournament after winning 21-18 and 21-19.
In women’s singles, China’s Xuan Deng, who is in the top 4, signaled her intentions with a 22-20, 21-9 win over Peru’s Katherine Winder.
Posted by Lucas Liau
on 10:46 AM.
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