Chan Peng Soon and Goh Liu Ying lose mixed doubles title to Tantowi Ahmad and Lilyana Natsir: Malaysian Open GP Gold 2011
A high flick serve in the last moments of the mixed doubles final of Malaysian Open Grand Prix Gold cost the home favourites, Chan Peng Soon and Goh Liu Ying, the title on Sunday, May 8 at the Jalan
s**a Menanti, Alor Setar.
The pair lost the title by 21-18, 15-21, 19-21 to Tantowi Ahmad and Lilyana Natsir of Indonesia in the final match that took 57 minutes to end.
The World Number 18, Chan and Goh, started off strong and edged past their opponents to take the first set 21-18. The duo took a 13-9 lead in the second game with a strong game-play from Liu Ying.
However, Ying lost her rhythm in the ending points of the second set and the Indonesians successfully capitalized on the opponents weak returns, clinching the game 15-21.
The pair from Malaysia was strong in the third game as they followed the path towards their second career title. They caught Ahmad and Natsir with an outstanding display of their badminton skills
at 19-20 but a high-flick serve at that moment from Chan went wrong and the Indonesians clinched the set at 19-21.
The World Number 10, Ahmad and Natsir, grabbed their third career title after Macau Open and India Open last week. Both Ahmad and Natsir established their partnership less than a year before.
The experienced Natsir stated, “We saw our opponents slowing down in the second and they looked tense. We took advantage and turned our game around..”
Meanwhile, visibly upset on losing the title, Chan said, “We did well to keep them at arm’s length at the start but we could not sustain it. We slowed down and that gave our opponents a lot of confidence
to break away. It is really frustrating. We could have won it if we had not slacked in the second game.”
Chan’s mixed doubles partner, Liu Ying, admitted that she made a couple of mistakes and after that she lost her balance to let her opponents take the match in the end.
“I did not fear them but I allowed them to take advantage of my weak defence today. I became quite edgy when I started to make all the mistakes. But overall, it has been a good outing for us. We will
continue to improve on our game.”
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