KUALA LUMPUR, April 26 — National men’s singles ace Ng Tze Yong’s campaign in the 2023 Badminton Asia Championships (BAC) in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) came to an abrupt halt when he fell to Hong Kong’s Lee Cheuk Yiu in the opening round today.
World number 25 Tze Yong was shown the exit after going down 17 – 21, 18 – 21 in 42 minutes at the Sheikh Rashid bin Hamdan Indoor Hall, Al Nasr Club.
This is Tze Yong’s first loss to world number 20 Cheuk Yiu, having beaten the Hong Kong shuttler in the Singapore Open last July.
In tomorrow’s second round, Cheuk Yiu will take on China’s world number 10 Shi Yu Qi, who received a first-round walkover from top seed Jonatan Christie of Indonesia.
Meanwhile, national men’s doubles pair Man Wei Chong – Tee Kai Wun produced a solid display to tame India’s P.S Ravikrishna – Sankar Prasad Udayakumar 21 – 12, 21 – 17 in their opening tie, which lasted 28 minutes.
The world number 28 pair will face fourth seeds Takuro Hoki – Yugo Kobayashi of Japan in the second round tomorrow.
National women’s singles professional shuttler S. Kisona suffered the same fate as Tze Yong when she fell 21 – 18, 15 – 21, 13 – 21 to Thailand’s Pornpawee Chochuwong in the first round.
World number 10 Pornpawee will meet sixth seed Wang Zhi Yi of China in the second round tomorrow.
It was also the end of the road for the national mixed doubles professional pair Chan Peng Soon – Cheah Yee See and the national women’s doubles professional combination of Ng Qi Xuan – Teoh Le Xuan.
While Chan- Cheah went down 12 – 21, 16 – 21 to India’s Rohan Kapoor – Reddy Sikki, Qi Xuan – Le Xuan were trounced 3 – 21, 10 – 21 by defending champions Chen Qing Chen – Jia Yi Fan of China.
— Bernama
