Chinese shuttlers to defend mixed doubles title at badminton world final

BASEL: Defending champions Zheng Siwei/Huang Yaqiong of China beat Japan’s Yuta Watanabe/Arisa Higashino on Saturday to reach the mixed doubles final of the Badminton World Championships in Basel, Switzerland.

Saturday’s victory came as their fastest in history as the Chinese couple swept their rivals 2111, 21-15 in 37 minutes, just one step away from defending their championship. Attention to details was the key to triumph, said Zheng after the match, recalling their widening of the points gap in the middle of the first game when their rivals made some adjustment trying to narrow the gap.

Huang attributed her victory to better preparedness and the Japanese couple’s little mistakes in a match that was actually, as she described it, nip and tuck. It all depended on who’s taking better care of tiny details, she added.

Before Saturday, Zheng/Huang had engaged in six matches with Watanabe/Higashino, leading with five wins, and their only loss being the reversal at All England Open last year. Their opponents in Sunday’s final will be Dechapol Puavaranukroh/Sapsiree Taerattanachai of Thailand, who had knocked out another Chinese duo Wang Yilyu/Huang Dongping in Saturday’s semifinals.

Last year’s mixed doubles finals saw Zheng/Huang beat their compatriots Wang Yilyu and Huang Dongping, who are the expected first and second seeds respectively this year. The two Chinese duos have claimed seven of the nine major World Tour titles played this season.

In the men’s doubles semifinals on Saturday, Takuro Hoki and Yugo Kobayashi of Japan beat Chinese pair Li Junhui and Liu Yu Chen in straight sets, 21-19 and 21-13, to meet Mohammad Ahsan and Hendra setiawan of Indonisia in the final.

In the men’s singles semifinals, Denmark’s Anders Antonsen swept his rival Kantaphon Wangcharoen of Thailand, 21-15 and 21-10, to challenge the top-seeded and defending champion Kento Momota of Japan in the final.

In the women’s doubles, Japan has already secured the champion after second seed Yuki Fukushima/Sayaka Hirota defeated Chinese duo Du Yue/Li Yinhui 21-11, 21-17, while another Japanese pair Mayu Matsumoto and Wakana Nagahara crushed their Indonesian rivals Greysia Polii and Apriyani Rahayu 21-12, 21-19.

Having advanced only to the mixed double among the overall five finals this year, the Chinese badminton legion has so far set the worst record in its history of the world championships.

Since its debut at the World Championships in 1983, the Chinese team has already participated in 22 such competitions, harvesting two champions every time except in 1993 and 1995 when only one gold was captured each year but with two players or pairs entering the finals.