Wasteful Tze Yong pays the price as Angus gets his revenge

PETALING JAYA: National men’s singles shuttler Ng Tze Yong’s campaign in the Thailand Masters came to an end when he went down 14-21, 20-22 to Hong Kong’s Angus Ng Ka Long in the quarter-finals at the Nimibutr National Stadium in Bangkok.

World No. 29 Tze Yong had opportunities to take the match to a decider as he led 14-10 and had a game point at 20-19 in the second game but could not capitalise on them against world No. 18 Angus.

For Angus, it was sweet revenge after he had suffered a shock loss to Tze Yong in their only meeting before this at the 2022 Singapore Open.

The in-form Hong Kong shuttler continues to be a thorn in the Malaysians’ as he had stunned world No. 4 Lee Zii Jia in the recent Indonesian Masters and beat his fellow independent player Cheam June Wei (No. 44) twice – in Jakarta and in the previous round of the Thailand Masters in Bangkok.

For Tze Yong, it was still his best finish this year after losing in the early rounds of his three previous outings – the Malaysian and Indian Opens and the Indonesian tourney.

“Our expectation for Tze Yong in this tournament was to reach the quarter-finals.

“Having said that, he could have at least taken the match to three games as he had the chance to do so,” said Badminton Association of Malaysia’s (BAM) high performance director Dr Tim Jones.

Tze Yong will now have a month to train and prepare for his next assignments - the German Open (March 7-12) and All-england (Mar 14-19).

“Now, we have time for a good training block to work on our new knowledge of him from the recent higher-level tournaments, so that we can help him improve before heading for Europe.

“I will spend time with the coaches and Tze Yong to understand more clearly on where he needs to improve on,” said Jones.