 After dominating the doubles in the team competition earlier in the week, China was left with only their two singles competitors on finals day of the World University Badminton Championships, but both Wang Yihan and Du Pengyu delivered golds to bring China's total to three on the week. Thailand continued to show off the prowess of its university students as Kunchala Voravichitchaikul (photo) nabbed both the women's and mixed doubles titles.
By Don Hearn. Photos: Badmintonphoto (archives)
When play began in Braga with the semi-finals at 9AM Saturday, China looked poised to do its usual domination act. In the team competition, the Chinese had cruised to the gold dropping only a single match and the perpetrator of that defeat, Kazushi Yamada of Japan, had been beaten a day earlier by Liao Sheng-Shiun of Chinese Taipei.
In fact, it even appeared that the afternoon's singles finals would be all-Chinese affairs as Du Pengyu and Chen Tianyu each took the first game of their respective semi-finals. However, Liao rebounded to beat Chen in 3 games even as his compatriot, top-seeded Hsieh Yu-Hsing made two big comebacks against Du but finally faltered and allowed the Chinese player to reach the final with a 21-16, 18-21, 21-17 win. There was less drama when Korea's Kim Mun Hee beat one Wang, Xin, to book a date with the other Wang in the women's singles final, with both women winning their semi-final matches in straight games.
For Wang Yihan, the women's singles final was a re-assertion of dominance over her Korean opponent, a player of the same age and almost the same height. In September, Kim scored her first win over Wang in four tries dating from when the two were juniors. Then on Wednesday, Wang still needed 3 games to beat her lanky challenger in the team final. On Saturday, however, Wang was back to business as usual as she dismissed Kim 21-10, 21-7 in just 23 minutes.
Du, meanwhile, struggled with Liao, much as he had with Hsieh in the semi-finals, but after allowing the Taiwan player to take the second game, Du ruled the deciding game and took the championship 21-17, 17-21, 21-11.
In doubles, Sun Junjie and Sun Xiaoli, undefeated in both team and individual competition this week, were on track to take all three titles between them. Once again, however, it was Chinese Taipei breaking up the Chinese party as two Wangs beat the two Suns in the first match of Saturday morning to make it to the finals.
Then Sun Junjie went down in the men's doubles to Korea's scratch pair Han/Han. In the quarter-finals, Sun and partner Tao Jiaming had beaten Korea's doubles specialists - 2007 World Junior Champion Shin Baek Cheol and 2006 WJC bronze-medallist Lee Jung Hwan - but for one last time in Braga, it was a men's singles specialist who proved to be the fly in the ointment. This time it was Han Ki Hoon, who is training with the Korean national team under Li Mao. In fact, in a domestic team tournament last week, Han/Han were picked to represent their university for only one doubles match, which they lost, possibly costing their school the national title. Still, they were too good for the Chinese on Saturday morning and won it 21-18, 21-14.
 In the last semi-final match, it was the turn of Thailand's Kunchala Voravichitchaikul to deny the Chinese Suns their last chance at a ticket to the finals. She and her regular partner, Duanganong Aroonkesorn, currently ranked 34th in the world, came back from one game down to beat top seeds Ding/Sun 18-21, 21-17, 21-15.
Kunchala had earlier denied Bona Septano his own chance at double finals appearances, while booking two for herself. The Indonesian did manage to take one title, however, as Septano and Mohammad Ahsan (photo) lived up to their status as the top seeds and the world's 44th-ranked pair by beating the Korean upstarts in just 21 minutes.
Kunchala, meanwhile, converted on both of her final appearances and took two doubles golds. She and partner Patiphat Chalardchalaem, though seeded second, had to work hard against unseeded Wang/Wang of Chinese Taipei but weathered the storm and won 21-16, 22-24, 21-18. The women's doubles was a much easier win for Thailand, however, as against Aroonkesorn and Voravichitchaikul beat Japan's Nakahara/Sekiya 21-16, 21-17 to claim a second title.
See all results HERE
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