Suzhou: The Group C champions – Malaysia, have been drawn to play against the Group A runners-up – Denmark in the 2023 Sudirman Cup knockout stage.
One of the most interesting match-ups in the tie between Malaysia and Denmark would be the men’s singles match, as Malaysia has two men’s singles players capable of creating problems for Denmark’s World No. 1 Viktor Axelsen. The first one is World No. 8 Lee Zii Jia who defeated Axelsen 30-29, 20-22, 21-9 in the 2021 All-England final. Although Lee lost to Axelsen twice since 2021 All England (2021 Denmark Open quarter-finals: 19-21, 19-21; 2022 Indonesia Open semi-finals: 21-19, 11-21, 21-23), he had only lost to the World No. 1 player in a very small margin.
Another men’s singles from Malaysia, the World No. 21 Ng Tze Yong, pulled off a huge upset in the 2023 All-England second round when he beat Axelsen 21-15, 9-21, 23-21.
However, it is completely possible that Denmark decided to field Rasmus Gemke instead of Viktor Axelsen in the tie between Malaysia and Denmark.
Meanwhile, defending champions – China, showed their superiority in badminton by trashing Denmark 5-0 in the last Group A action on Thursday and the hosts have been drawn to meet Indonesia in the quarter-finals on Friday.
Highlights of China vs. Denmark at 2023 Sudirman Cup:
In Thursday’s tie against Denmark, China’s World No. 1 mixed doubles Zheng Siwei and Huang Yaqiong eased past Mathias Thyrri/Amalie Magelund 21-9, 21-19 to win the first point for their team.
The decider of the men’s singles match between Rasmus Gemke and Li Shifeng was an ugly game. As usual, Li started applying multiple dirty tactics to disturb the flow of the game and tried to interrupt Gemke many times. We were surprised the umpire didn’t do anything about Li Shifeng’s unacceptable behavior on the court. If BWF is reading this article, we urge BWF to instruct its umpire to pay close attention to every of Li Shifeng’s matches and if necessary, hit Li Shifeng with yellow and red cards to stop him from applying those unethical tactics on the court.
Li eventually won the men’s singles match 21-15, 16-21, 21-15.
China’s Tokyo Olympics women’s singles gold medalist Chen Yufei eased past Line Christophersen 21-8, 21-11 to make it 3-0 for China before Liu Yuchen/Ou Xuanyi and Chen Qingchen/Jia Yifan also won their respective matches in men’s doubles and women’s doubles.
On Friday, Thailand will play Japan and Chinese Taipei will meet Korea in the morning, before Malaysia, Denmark, China, and Indonesia start their respective quarter-final proceedings in the afternoon.
