LI NING CHINA MASTERS Day 3 - Chinese Youngsters Shine

Tine.RASMUSSEN-20-DEN-YN-EuropeanTeamChampionships2009

Tine Rasmussen and Joachim Persson were shown the exit by two of China's new stars - Wang Xin and Du Pengyu.

By Manoj Singh, Badzine Correspondent. Photos : Badmintonphoto (archives)

The day three of the 2009 Li Ning China Masters Super Series was fully dominated by the Chinese players as they performed well on their home ground. The day started out well for the home country and some even knocked at the door of fame. Chief among these was Philippine Open champion Wang Xin of China. Though Wang had already beaten the world #1 in Manila, this was her first opportunity to grab a piece a piece of Super Series limelight. The current world #71 defeated Tine Rasmusen of Denmark 17-21, 21-16, 21-14. In the first game, she could not match Tine's speed but in the 2nd and 3rd games, she didn't give any chances to the Danish veteran, who is still yet to get back her stamina and confidence after a few months away from competition, due to injury.

In another confrontation, Malaysia GP Gold champion Wang Shixian of China added Hong Kong's Wang Chen to the impressive list of scalps she has accumulated in just a few short months on the senior stage. In the first game, Shixian beat her opponent 21-11 before the Hong Kong resident withdrew in the second.

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DU.Pengyu-16-CHN-RS-BadmintonAsiaChampionships2009

In the second longest of the total seven matches to run over an hour on the the day, 5th seed and world champion Lu Lan took care of 10th-seeded compatriot Jiang Yanjiao, playing very cleverly to clinch the match in two games that still ran to 69 minutes.

In the other side of the women's singles draw, Pi Hongyan of France struggled against world #50 Kaori Imabeppu of Japan. Beaten 16-21 in the first game, the French shuttler had to dig deep to come back both in the second and third games, in spite of initially ceding big margins in both. The French ace, however, managed to win in three games.

The men's singles saw all the seeded players go through except fifth-seeded Joachim Persson, who lost to Du Pengyu of China - a touch battle until the very end. In the first game, the Dane was able to keep safe but in the last two he had to bow to the Asian Championship semi-finalist, who came out on top of the 22-20, 14-21, 20-22 contest after one hour and 11 minutes of play.

Peter Gade of Denmark once again struggled against Shon Wan Ho of Korea but still finished the match in three games of 21-11, 18-21, 21-13 after 64 minutes.

"Today's match was much harder as expected against Shon Wan Ho from Korea. I met him in the quarterfinal in Korea as well and also played 3 games with him then. He's a physical strong player and I had to work hard for my points. Tomorrow is against Boonsak from Thailand," Peter said on his Facebook profile.

PI.Hongyan-19-FRA-YN-EuropeanTeamChampionships2009

PI.Hongyan-19-FRA-YN-EuropeanTeamChampionships2009

It was a bad day for England as both Rajiv Ouseph and Andrew Smith could not do better than the second round of the Li Ning China Masters Super Series.

Another good 64-minute match was seen between Chen Jin and Bao Chunlai. They played good strokes and smashes against each other but Chen Jin finally emerged the winner over Bao, 21-19 in the decider.

Doubles continues to be a display of domination by the Chinese. In mixed, the only Chinese pair to face a visiting duo was Xu Chen / Zhao Yunlei. After being beaten three times in the past year by the top Koreans, Xu/Zhao seemed to relish their 21-9, 21-10 drubbing of Korea's number two, Yoo/Kim. Korea still has the only non-Chinese entry in the quarter-finals as Ko/Ha beat compatriots Shin/Jang to set up a repeat of their All England final with He/Yu.

In women's doubles, the only pair to top China was former Chinese players Zhang/Zhang, now of Macau. They needed 3 games to see off newly-crowned Asian Junior Champions Tang/Xia 21-15, 17-21, 21-15. Zhang/Zhang are joined in the quarter-finals by six Chinese pairs as well as second-seeded Kim/Ha of Korea, who will be hoping to return the favour to Gao/Wei, who dealt the Koreans a narrow defeat at home earlier this year.

The men's doubles showed China's only weakness on the day as all four visiting pairs advanced past local opposition to leave China with only their three best pairs and unseeded Li Rui / Rao Yuqiang, who advanced through the void left but the withdrawn top seeds. Korea's Ko/Kwon barely made it past Sun/Tao 21-14, 19-21, 26-24 and now must face the mighty World Champions Fu Haifeng / Cai Yun in the quarter-finals.

For complete results from the 2009 Li Ning China Masters Super Series, please CLICK HERE

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