Yew Sin-Ee Yi still doing homework
ONG Yew Sin-Teo Ee Yi are treating every tournament, including the ongoing Australian Open, as the best training ground for the Kuala Lumpur Sea Games (KL2017).
Yesterday, the national No 2 men’s doubles scored another easy win over Indonesian qualifiers Saputra Alvindo-Ferdinand Sinarta Surbakti, thrashing them 21-9, 21-7 to reach the quarterfinals.
The Malaysians, who will stay back in Kuala Lumpur for the Sea Games instead of travelling to Glasgow for the World Championships, want to make it count, especially on home ground.
When contacted in Sydney yesterday, Ee Yi said: ”Our first two rounds here have been rather easy, because our opponents were not really strong.
“However, having said that, we did not take any of them lightly and played to our true potential because every tournament we played in so far is treated seriously as a warm-up for the KL Games.
“Our target at the Australian Open is to go as far as we could. Our opponents in the last eight (today) won’t be easy, we even lost to them last week in Jakarta (Indonesia Open), but we wont give up,” said Ee Yi, who will face world No 10 Liu Cheng-Zhang Nan of China next.
On their Sea Games target, Ee Yi said: “For now, this is our last tournament and then it’s back to training at home for the Games.
“The men’s doubles event will not be easy, so Yew Sin and I would like to first reach the semifinals, and then take it from there.”
Meanwhile, it was the end of the road for high flying mixed doubles duo Tan Kian Meng-Lai Pei Jing.
After stunning Olympic champions Tontowi Ahmad-Liliyana Natsir in the opening round of Wednesday. the Malaysian pair lost 21-16, 23-21 to Japan’s Yugo Kobayashi-Misaki Matsutomo in the second round yesterday.
Scratch pair Chan Peng SoonCheah Yee See, who will compete in the Sea Games, however, kept the Malaysian flag flying when they saw off Indonesia’s Hendra Tandjaya-Sekartaji Putri 21-10, 21-5. Peng Soon-Yee See are up against seventh seeds Praveen Jordan-Debby Susanto next.
Also through to the quarterfinals were independent men’s doubles duo Hendra Setiawan of Indonesia and Malaysia’s Tan Boon Heong.
Hendra-Boon Heong upset sixth seeds Lee Jhe Huei-Lee Yang 21-17, 21-11 in the second round and will play Japan’s Takuto Inoue-Yuki Kaneko next for a place in the semi-finals. Fabian Peter