Odense: Both Carolina Marin and Chou Tien Chen overcame some quarter-finals wobbles to progress at the Denmark Open on Friday.
The Olympic women’s singles gold medalist Carolina Marin came back from losing the first set 17-21 to Zhang Beiwen of USA, battling from 11-14 down in the second set and 1-4 in the decider to clinch the last two sets 21-17, 21-14 in a quarter-final match that lasted 63 minutes.
Marin will meet Yvonne Li of Germany in the semi-finals as Li also went to the distance to see off Lianne Tan of Belgium 15-21, 21-12, 21-17 in 57 minutes.
Japan’s women’s singles No. 2 seed Nozomi Okuhara barely broke a sweat in reaching the Denmark Open semi-finals with a 21-6, 21-12 trashing of Julie Dawall Jakobsen from Denmark in 29 minutes. Okuhara will play Michelle Li of Canada on Saturday.
In men’s singles, No. 2 seed Chou Tien Chen survived a tough challenge from No. 5 seed Kidambi Srikanth of India before entering the semi-finals.
The first set saw both Chou and Srikanth fought all the way to 18-18, although Chou had the game point at 20-19, he made three mistakes allowing Srikanth to claim the first set 22-20.
Chou got to a quick start in the second set, relying on his aggressiveness, he jumped to a 10-3 before winning the second set 21-13. In the decider, Chou upped his tempo after the mid-game interval, launching a wave of attacks to open up the lead and ultimately won the decider 21-16.
Chou will face Denmark’s “golden boy” Anders Antonsen in the semi-finals.
The No. 7 seed Rasmus Gemke of Denmark will battle the No. 6 seed, Kenta Nishimoto of Japan in another men’s singles semi-final.
