Ahn Se-young of Japan faces Saena Kawakami in the women’s singles quarterfinals at the Korea Open Badminton Championships held at Palma Gymnasium in Suncheon, Jeollanam-do on the 8th. Provided by the Korea Badminton Association
Ahn Se-young (20, Samsung Life Insurance), a signboard of Korean women’s badminton, has only two steps left to reach the top of the Korea Open.
Ahn Se-young defeated Japanese ambush Saena Kawakami 2-0 (21-) in the women’s singles quarterfinals of the World Badminton Federation (BWF) World Tour 500 Series 2022 Korea Open Badminton Championships (total prize money of $350,000) held at Palma Gymnasium in Suncheon, Jeollanam-do on the 8th. 14 21-7) and advanced to the semifinals. From the first round, she had a three-game clean set streak, and she also cleaned up the 1-2 defeat she suffered at the 2019 Osaka Open by Kawakami.
Ahn Se-young started off nervously at 2-6 in the beginning of the first set, but soon found stability and turned the tide to 9-6. She even allowed a tie, 14-14, as she pursued Kawakami, but Se-Young Ahn went down with a one-beat quick attack and scored 7 points to take the first set. In the second set, where she gained momentum, she ran 18-7 and took the lead early.
Ahn Se-young, who was eliminated from the round of 32 at the most recent 2019 tournament, has since grown into a world-class player. In particular, he took second place at the All English Open (Super 1000), the world’s most prestigious badminton international competition held last month. At that time, he defeated Tai Ziying (Taiwan), world No. 1 in the semifinals, and raised expectations for the championship, but lost to Yamaguchi Akane (Japan) in the final. Yamaguchi, who defeated Ahn Se-young and won the All-Young Open, overtook Tai Ziying to become world number one.
Tai Ziying and Yamaguchi did not appear at the Korea Open this year. Among the participating players, Chen Yufei (3rd place, China), the only higher ranker than Ahn Se-young (4th) and gold medalist at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, was defeated by Korea’s Ga-eun Kim in the round of 16, making Se-young Ahn’s victory even more powerful.
Meanwhile, Ga-eun Kim (Samsung Life Insurance), the main character of the surprise who caught Cheon Yu-Pay, also joined the quarter-finals by winning the quarterfinals 2-0 (21-15 21-18) against Jinwei Ko (Malaysia).
The mixed doubles semifinal has become a Korean family fight. In the quarterfinals of the hop doubles event held earlier that day, Ko Seong-hyeon and Eom Hye-won (Gimcheon City Hall) defeated Indonesia’s Adnan Mullana and Mycel Christine Bandaso 2-1 (21-19 18-21 21-18) to advance to the quarterfinals. did. Ko Seong-hyeon and Eom Hye-won group continued their upward trend of advancing to the quarterfinals of three consecutive tournaments following the Indonesia Masters and the Indonesian Open last year. Ko Seong-hyeon and Uhm Hye-won advance to the final with Kim Won-ho (Samsung Life Insurance) and Jeong Na-eun (Hwasun-gun Office) who defeated Ong Yu-shin-Kori Wooing (Malaysia) 2-1 (21-14 21-23 21-16) in another quarterfinal. fight the
In the men’s doubles quarterfinals, Kang Min-hyeok (Samsung Life Insurance) and Seo Seung-jae (Army Sports Corps) defeated India’s Satwick Sairaz Rankiredi and Chirag Shetty 2-1 (22-20 18-21 22-20).
The Korea Open, the only international badminton tournament in Korea, which celebrated its 31st year this year, was held for the first time in three years since the 2019 Incheon Games due to the prolonged Corona 19. Past Kim Moon-soo-Park Joo-bong and Jeong So-young-Hwang Hye-young’s men’s and women’s doubles win together (1991~1992), Bae Soo-hyeon’s women’s singles wins twice (1993~1994), Kim Dong-moon-Ra Kyung-min’s mixed doubles 6 times (1999~2004), doubles It is a tournament with many achievements, including winning all three events (2016). However, in 2017-2018, they were only undefeated for two consecutive years, and in 2019, Kim So-young (Incheon International Airport)-Gong Hee-yong (Jeonbuk Bank) won the women’s doubles only.
Hwanhee Sung reporter [email protected]
