Stacy Shi
Hong Kong’s badminton mixed pair Tse Ying-suet and Jordan Tang Chun-man won silver medals at the Japan Open yesterday, their first international event after the Paris Olympics.
They lost 0-2 to China’s second-seeded pair Jiang Zhenbang and Wei Yaxin.
The Hong Kong duo will return home today and participate in the upcoming Hong Kong Open scheduled from September 10 to 15 at the Hong Kong Coliseum.
This was the second meeting between the two teams, with China’s pair having won 2-1 in the French Open final last year.
In the Japan Open final, the Chinese team had the upper hand in the first set, winning 21-12. In the second game, the Hong Kong initially established a 9-4 lead and reached 11-9 before the interval, with numerous spectators encouraging them in Cantonese. However, their opponents increased their pace to catch up and scored five points in a row to take the lead, resulting in Hong Kong’s defeat at 21-12 in the second set.
Head coach Tim He Yiming praised the Hong Kong pair’s “outstanding performance,” saying it was exceptional for them to reach the finals of one of the Badminton World Federation’s World Tour Super 750 events, especially given they had trained for less than two weeks after returning from Paris.
He said “their physical condition was not optimal as the pair’s full-attendance of three games in each of the previous four rounds of the tournament – as well as fatigue after returning from Paris – led to physical strain.”