Malaysia falls prey to Japan in the semi-final of Thomas Cup preliminaries
Malaysia fell prey to Japan yesterday and lost the semi-final of the Thomas Cup Asian Zone qualifying round in Macau.
However, Malaysia has already achieved its target in hunt for ticket to Thomas Cup finals to be held in Wuhan, China from May this year.
Malaysia will now compete Indonesia today to end this event with standing on third position.
Malaysia, as expected, played against Japan without World Number one Lee Chong Wei who decided to stay off-court and rest for All-England Badminton Championship.
Malaysian reserved players, Dren Liew and Mohamad Arif Abdul Latif were given a chance to prove their mettle at international level but they could not fill the gap of the maestro Lee.
Muhammad Hafiz Hashim, who performed really well against India in last match, also failed to repeat his previous form and lost to World Number six Sho Sasaki in opening game of the match.
The Japanese shuttler was class act against his rival in first set and despite of Hafiz’s strong resistance, he won by scoring 21-19 in the first set. Sho Sasaki snatched the first match point by winning second set with 21-16 score on the board.
The Malaysian duo Lim Khim Wah-Goh V Shem, who delivered a stunner against Korea, was the next to lock horn with Japanese couple Noriyasu Hirata-Hirokatsu Hashimoto. The game prolonged to 50 minutes and ended with the Japanese raising their lead to 2-0.
The Japanese shuttlers hammered their opponent Malaysian couple with 21-11, 11-21 and 21-18 score on board.
The next Singles game turned into surviving battle for Malaysia, so Malaysian shuttler Daren Liew put a great show and resisted almost for an hour before his Japanese opponent, World Number seven Kenichi Tago ensured Japan’s victory by winning third match
point.
The Tago’s final score of 30-28 and 21-19 concluded the show and Malaysia’s remaining singles and doubles players did not play even a single shot as the last two games turned trivial.
Malaysia is meeting Indonesia today in the tussle for the third position in Thomas Cup preliminaries.
Malaysian squad is expected to have Muhammad Hafiz Hashim, Daren Liew and Mohamad Arif Abdul Latif for Singles encounters while the pair of Lim Khim Wah-Goh V Shem will join the duo Tan Boon Heong-Hoon Thien How in doubles category.
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