Olympic champion Chen Yufei reaches last 16 at All England Badminton

LONDON, March 13 (Xinhua) -- China's Olympic champion Chen Yufei beat Nguyen Thuy Linh of Vietnam in straight sets in the women's singles first round at the All England Open Badminton Championships on Wednesday.

Chen suffered a tough defeat to one of her arch rivals Akane Yamaguchi of Japan 21-15, 18-21, 22-20 in the semifinals at the French Open last week. She came to Birmingham with blisters on her feet and couldn't find her rhythm on Wednesday until the late stage of the first set.

"I struggled a bit due to a slow start," said Chen who took the victory 21-16, 21-12 after 37 minutes. "But after I found my rhythm, my opponent began to make mistakes."

Yamaguchi battled to the second round by winning over Chinese Zhang Yaman 21-18 and 22-20 while the top seed An Se-young from South Korea saw off Hsu Wen-chi of Chinese Taipei 21-17, 21-16.

In the men's singles, last year's finalist Shi Yuqi came from one set down to edge out Danish Rasmus Gemke 18-21, 23-21 and 21-19.

The Chinese shuttler was crowned at the French Open last Sunday and admitted it's quite hard to stay sharp at All England.

"I felt my steps were heavy and my shots were not clinical," said Shi. "But I'm glad that I didn't give up and kept finding ways to go through."