Top Seed Hashim and Olympic Champion Ji Fall at Badminton WorldsTop seed Roslin M. Hashim of Malaysia and Olympic champion Ji Xinpeng of China were both eliminated by shuttlers from Hong Kong, China in the second round of the world badminton championships Wednesday in Seville when Chinese continued to show their dominance in the women's competition.World number one Hashim, titlist in this year's Japan Open and Swiss Open, suffered a surprise defeat to little-known Tam Kai Chuen 15-10, 15-8 and Ji crashed out at the hands of another Agus Hariyanto 12-15, 15-11, 15-4. Hashim, 25, who claimed the world top place right before the world championships in the place of Dane Peter Gade, found him controlled by the world 32nd-ranked Tam and unlikely to recover. "He played aggressively today and I cannot control the game," Hashim said. "I had expected he would play like that because I saw his performance in this year's All England championships." He added: "I feel very disappointed. I had never expected to lose so early." Tam, 24, said he had been fully prepared before the game and were confident of achieving an upset victory. "I had studied Roslin's game with my coach and I knew he liked to play defensively. I knew what I had to do to beat him. I think my strengths were the fact that I dominated the front of the court. My tactics were to play fast, short attacks. "This is not only the best win of my life, but it's the best men's singles win ever for Hong Kong." Ji, who has slipped from top place to 11th in the world rankings, managed a first-set win 15-12 after coming back from 8-9 behind. But the 24-year-old failed to show the calibre which took him to Olympic champion, dropping easily to his rival in the second and third sets. "I desperately want to win this time and I was confident before the match. I can only say that I am not in my best form tonight," said Ji, who has not tasted a title after the Sydney Olympic Games. Ji confessed his defeat resulted from a "mental" reason rather than a "technical" or "physical" one. "I will take some rest after returning home and try to figure out what's really wrong. And then I will work harder to walk out of the shadow. " Elsewhere, world number two Gade routed Martin Hagberg of Sweden 15-7, 15-1; third seed Taufik Hidayat of Indonesia knocked out Ronald Susilo of Singapore 15-12, 15-12; Chinese Chen Hong, seeded fourth, beat Indra Wijaya of Singapore 15-4, 15-8; All England champion Pulella Gopichand of India fought back from one set down to defeat U.S. player Han Kevin 6-15, 15-11, 15-7; Ninth seeded Xia Xuanze snatched a second place for China by beating Conrad Hueckstaedt of Germany 15-8, 15-9. On the women's side, China showed dominance when all their five players advanced to the last 16. Olympic champion Gong Zhichao, who has won all the major titles but the world champion, eased past Kyoko Komuro of Japan 11-1, 11- 6 in just 16 minutes. She will next take on Wang Chen of Hong Kong, China, a 11-7, 11-1 winner over Brenda Beenhakkenr of Netherlands. World number three Gong Ruina defeated Wong Miew Kheng of Malaysia 13-10, 11-2; Second seed Zhou Mi crushed another Malaysian Ng Mee Fen 11-0, 11-4; Zhang Ning took 13 minutes to dispose of South Korea's Lee Kyung won 11-0, 11-1; Dai Yun, ranked 14th in the world, came back from one set deficit to beat Lidya Djaelawijaya of Indonesia 8-11, 11-0, 11-5. World number one Camilla Martin of Denmark also advanced after whitewashing Neli Boteva of Bulgaria 11-0, 11-1 in only eight minutes. The defending champion will meet Chinese Dai in the next round. |
| People's Daily Online --- http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/ |